Robbed
by Trish47
Summary: The job has stolen something precious from each of them: Sight. Security. Power. Choice. Love. Life. Can their losses be overcome? Future-fic with established A/A. Ensemble piece. Strong T material. Enjoy.
1. The Assignment Is

**So, it's time for a little variety. Most of what I've written for A/A is lighthearted and fluffy. This story is going in a different, more angsty direction. I've been working on this one for a long while now. I hope that my efforts have paid off. More importantly, I hope you enjoy!**

**Note: This is set about a year and a half after the Season One finale. Annie and Auggie are in a relationship. If you want to know how they got together, choose almost any other story on this site, many of which are awesome. :)**

**Disclaimer: I do not own _Covert Affairs_ or its wonderful cast of characters. I just borrow them for my own entertainment.**

* * *

><p><strong>Robbed<strong>

_Part One: The Assignment Is . . ._

His knuckles tap lightly against the bathroom door. "You okay in there?"

Pushing down the handle, Annie watches the mixture of water and vomit swirl around the toilet bowl before it is sucked down with a wet gurgle. Her hand shakes as she runs her fingers through her hair and swipes the moisture from underneath her eyes with the back of her nails.

Getting up from the floor is a slow process, but once she's upright, her nerves are calmer and her stomach isn't queasy anymore. Annie reaches over to unlatch the bathroom door, wiping the corners of her mouth with the back of her other hand. Luckily, she'd gotten home from the airport late last night and dinner had consisted of a bagel with cream cheese outside the taxi bay; there wasn't much to empty out of her stomach this morning.

When she opens the door, Auggie's leaning against the frame, his orange Nintendo 64 sleep-shirt clashing with his plaid lounge pants. He gives her that look—a combination of curiosity and worry—that makes her need to reassure him there's nothing wrong to ease the creases in his forehead.

"I just feel a little sick," she tells him.

His pout fades fractionally at her honesty. "Any better now?"

"Much. I think it was that ten-hour flight that did me in."

He ghosts his fingertips along the wall as he enters the bathroom. Annie grabs a cup off of the sink and fills it with water. She moves to the side so Auggie can reach his precisely arranged toiletries. Auggie lathers shaving cream on his face while she rinses her mouth out. She swishes and spits any remaining bits of partially digested bagel into the basin.

"I swear every time I take a flight longer than five hours, I catch some kinda bug."

"Recycled air will do that to you."

"Especially when you're in coach at the height of flu season," she adds.

He cleans off the razor between swipes, hitting the blades against the side of the sink. Annie reaches around him for her toothbrush and squeezes a glob of toothpaste onto the bristles.

"I thought you got a flu shot?" Auggie asks between the strokes of his razor.

"I did," Annie mumbles around her toothbrush. She finishes brushing her teeth, then adds, "Those shots can be unreliable. I might have to get another one."

"Can you do that?"

"I don't know," she says. "I just wish antibiotics got rid of all my problems. Not just the nose stuff."

"I think we have Pepto somewhere."

"Nah, I'll be fine. I feel better now," she assures him again. "But I can't keep getting sick like this every time Joan sends me overseas."

"She's been sending you out a lot lately," Auggie comments.

He nicks himself just above his Adam's apple and swears in frustration, hitting the blades against the sink harder than necessary.

"Here, let me," Annie offers.

Auggie relinquishes the razor and she slips in between him and the sink, leaning her backside against the counter. She drags the razor over his stubble, leaving a trail of smooth skin behind with each scrape. As she repeats the motion over and over, Annie recalls her recent missions from memory.

Madrid. Scottsdale, Arizona. Bali. A few minor operations around the D.C. area. Genoa, Italy. It's been a long, action-packed month. Even if most of those trips only included routine surveillance stints or exchanges of intel, the sheer number of miles she's covered and airports she's visited is impressive and tiring to think about.

"I guess I have been gone a lot this past month," she says as she finishes shaving the second half of his face and neck. She begins removing the shaving cream residue on his skin with a warm, wet washcloth. "Explains why I've been so tired lately."

"Joan's making you work hard for your salary," he teases.

Auggie rests his hands at her hips, his thumbs sliding under the fabric of her underwear and rubbing her skin.

"I miss you when you're gone," he adds in a lower octave, flashing a mischievous smile. His words are sincere even though he's clearly trying to get into her pants; he's already halfway there.

She pats his cheek dry with the other end of the washcloth, then lightly kisses the same spot.

"I miss you when I'm gone too."

Auggie's response is to kiss her fully on the mouth.

"How much did you miss me?" he asks, barely pulling away from her lips. He grinds his body against hers suggestively.

She moans at the feeling and bites her lower lip, trying to restrain herself and maintain some level of control.

"I'll get you sick," she warns, trying to scare him off.

"I'm not scared of a few Annie Walker cooties."

She smiles against his mouth as he kisses her again in a series of short pecks.

"Aug, we have work. We'll be late."

One hand moves to the apex of her thighs, the other to the nape of her neck, his thumb brushing over her cheek.

"Not that late," he argues, then says in a more playful tone, "Can't you feel how much I missed you?"

Oh, she feels it all right. Her senses overflow with the man who's trying to drive her to distraction. All she can see, hear, smell, feel and taste is Auggie.

His warm breath tickles the hairs along her neck; he's going in for the kill. Even blind, he always manages to find the exact spot below her ear that makes it impossible to resist him. He hits her trigger point dead on, every time.

His mouth hovers above the sensitive spot, teasing her. The anticipation is enough to send tingles across her skin; the foreign hand between her legs might have something to do with the little prickles of pleasure too.

"I need an answer, Ms. Walker."

The vibrations from his voice on her flesh make her give in. Annie pulls his head against her neck, her left hand threading through his hair. His free hand begins moving her underwear over her backside and down her legs. She feels his triumphant smile as he kisses and nips at the skin just behind her jawbone.

"You're apologizing to Joan this time," she tells him in the most authoritative tone she can manage.

"Fair enough."

* * *

><p>"You're late."<p>

The announcement is stated loud enough to attract more than a few curious eyes in their direction, turning Auggie and Annie's arrival into a walk of professional shame.

"I thought you said you were keeping an eye out for her?" Auggie whispers out of the side of his mouth as they walk down the hall.

"She came out of nowhere," Annie whispers back.

Joan waits at the end of the hallway, hair pulled back in a slick ponytail, dress devoid of any hint of a wrinkle, and lips as straight and thin as a knife's edge.

Annie brings them to a stop a safe distance away and tries to look contrite. The after-sex aura Auggie exudes makes it difficult to pull off.

"Care to explain why you're almost an hour late without any sort of notification?"

Annie will kill him if he doesn't keep his promise to come up with an excuse for their boss this morning. For a large majority of times they've been late over the past year, it's been up to her to concoct plausible excuses. But Auggie lives up to his word.

"I could detail it for you," he says, "but that might constitute sexual harassment. Of whom, I'm not sure."

Annie might just kill him. In her mind, she's shaking him back in forth with her hands wrapped around his neck. In reality, she has to settle with her elbow discretely burrowing its way into his ribs as they stand side by side before Joan. Auggie doesn't flinch or make any attempt to apologize to her or their superior, but continues to beam his five-hundred-watt smile.

Joan's face falters slightly. But, as always, she quickly composes herself and says in a more confidential tone, "Next time, either think of a legitimate excuse for why you're late, or don't let it happen again."

"I'll write up a list," he says.

Just as Annie is seriously considering slapping him on the back of his head for his crass comments, a shadow of a smile pulls at the corners of Joan's lips. Annie breathes a little.

"Jai is waiting for us in Tech Ops," Joan informs them, getting back to the business at hand. "I have a new assignment I'd like to discuss with you, Annie, now that you're here."

"Another assignment? So soon?" Annie asks.

"I know you've just returned, but this is a matter of great importance."

Even if she's been exhausted lately because of the volume of her workload, something inside of Annie always gets excited when she hears that Joan has another assignment for her. Annie may have been working for Joan for almost two years now, but she is still an eager junior agent.

"Of course, if you need a few days off, I'm sure there are other agents. . ."

"Nope," Annie interrupts. "I'm up for it."

* * *

><p>"These are images taken from Senator Kridler's office," Jai says, bringing up a series of four grainy images onto the center computer screen in Auggie's office—the hub of all technical operations within the DPD. "This was the only footage captured before the cameras went offline."<p>

"So we know whoever the robber's accomplice is has terrible timing," Auggie comments, "Or he's just really bad at his job."

Annie takes a long look at the four pictures. One figure, dressed in an all black business suit, stars in each frame. Though Annie can tell that the figure is a woman from the long brunette hair hanging around the person's shoulders, there aren't many other details that stick out. The first image shows the woman entering the office with her hand held in front of her face, the last picture is a shot of her back as she leaves the office, and the two photos in between feature the woman rifling through Senator Kridler's desk, her long hair shielding her face from view.

"There's nothing to go on here," she says, "The camera never got a shot of the robber's face."

"So there's no chance of getting a hit off facial recognition software," Auggie translates, then begins typing on his keyboard without saying what he's searching for.

"What did they take?" Jai asks.

Joan stands behind Auggie's chair, arms crossed, her eyes concentrated on the images on the screen. "They stole a flash-drive with a list of names."

"Whose names?" Auggie questions, still skimming his fingers along the strip of lighted Braille at the base of his keyboard.

Joan sighs—it's the same sigh she always gives when she has to share information that she and the higher ups would rather keep on a need-to-know basis.

"Classified names," she states. "All you need to know is that, if this list gets into the wrong hands, dozens of deep-cover operatives will be compromised. It's crucial we recover the information before that happens."

"Here," Auggie says. "Look at these."

He replaces the pictures from the senator's office with even lower quality pictures from a cluster of shops outside of the Congressional Building. In every picture is an image of the two thieves—the woman from the senator's office and a man, similarly dressed in black. The timestamps on each image are within a minute of each other. In every shot, they're on foot and headed east.

"This is looking like an inside job," Jai says. "That woman knew what she was looking for in Senator Kridler's office. She was in and out in two minutes."

"Maybe they're locals?" Annie hypothesizes after analyzing the new batch of photos. The robbers blend in well with the D.C. crowd and know exactly where they're going. Something in Annie's gut tells her that Jai's theory is correct; whoever stole Senator Kridler's flash-drive had access and inside information.

"Can you enlarge the third picture?" Annie asks.

Auggie makes the image larger.

Jai leans in to examine the photo more closely. "Zoom in on the upper right quadrant."

Auggie types in a few more commands and enlarges the picture further. The female robber's face is partially visible in the shot.

"Run an ID using that image," Joan orders. "Crosscheck it with a list of employees who have access to Senator Kridler's office. See what you can find."

"On it," Auggie says. "I'll see what Stu can dig up about Kridler's staff." He stands and leaves the room, using his laser guide to make his way to Stu's desk. His face is determined and serious now.

Joan turns to her remaining agents. "I need you two ready to leave at a moment's notice. You should take this time to gather anything you may need."

* * *

><p>Annie returns from her short break with a small duffel bag hanging off of her shoulder.<p>

She sees Auggie come out of Tech Ops, a piece of paper in hand, rushing toward Joan's upstairs office. Instead of going to her desk, she follows him.

Joan motions Annie in with her hand. Jai is already in the room, reading over the paper Auggie printed out.

"We got a hit?" she asks.

Auggie nods and comes to stand closer to her. He edges behind her, resting his hand on her shoulder.

"The woman in the photo is one Kate Harris. She's on Senator Kridler's Intelligence Committee," Jai reports, reading from the paper in his hand.

"And her associate?" Annie asks.

"Still unknown."

"We've been tracking Harris' cell phone GPS," Auggie says. "But if she gets smart—which I'm not predicting will happen—she might ditch the phone and we'll lose the signal."

"Where is their current location?" Jai asks, still scanning the paper.

Annie prays for it to be somewhere that doesn't require a change in time zone. She's still getting over her jetlag from her return trip from Genoa. She doesn't think her stomach can handle another long trip.

"Yorktown, Virginia," Auggie answers.

"You'll be leaving immediately," Joan tells them.

* * *

><p><strong>This chapter is more of a setupprologue. If you come back for part two, which I surely hope you do, we'll get more into the action. Can I entice you by telling you the title of the next part is: ". . .A Disaster"? *wiggles eyebrows persuasively***

**Reviews mean more than you know!**

** There are so many people to thank for helping this project get off the ground and stay that way: Phoenix, Georgie, Patricia, Kira. I can't begin to say how much I appreciate your help, encouragement and suggestions!**


	2. A Disaster

**Wow. The response to part one blew me away. Thanks again to everyone who read/reviewed and anyone who is giving this story a chance! :)**

**If you come across names (first or last) that you recognize from another show, it's because I like paying tribute to my other favorite shows in my writing.**

**Also, I'm going to be cycling through multiple perspectives throughout this story, but it'll just be one character at a time. Part one was Annie, and this one's from Jai's point of view. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p><em>Part Two: . . . A Disaster<em>

Com-links, short-wave radios, tracking devices and other communication equipment they may need in Yorktown are all packed into the small briefcase that swings back and forth in Jai's hand. This isn't the kind of mission that requires guns or a large contingent of agents to complete; it's a pretty standard operation. The only difference is an untold number of agents' lives and deep-cover assignments hang in the balance. The pressure to come home with the senator's stolen flash-drive is enough to make Jai sweat around the neckline of his collared shirt.

He adjusts his tie with his free hand as he strides up to Auggie's office. Lowered voices make him slow as he draws nearer. He comes to a complete stop outside of the office entryway, listening and peering around the corner.

Jai can see Annie's arms wrapped around Auggie's torso in a close embrace, her back facing him. Annie's voice is muffled by the fabric of Auggie's cardigan, where her face is buried. One of Auggie's hands is tangled into the hair at the base of her neck. His head rests on top of hers while his other hand reaches across her back to squeeze her opposite shoulder.

Jai clears his throat to announce himself. Annie jumps at the sound, but Auggie doesn't.

"It's okay, Jai," he says. "Come on in."

Annie quickly relaxes her hold on her lover and steps back. Jai notices the slight blush on her cheeks as she smoothes her hair and pulls at the hem of her suit jacket. He's seen her flustered like this on more than a few occasions; Annie is always embarrassed when she gets caught sharing intimate moments with her partner.

Jai understands her reaction. Even if the Company encourages in-house dating, that doesn't mean it condones public displays of affection in the office.

"We're prepped to go," Jai tells Annie. He brings the briefcase up to chest level as a visual aid. "Stu outfitted us with all the tech we may need. Joan wanted us on the road ten minutes ago."

"I'm ready."

She starts to turn away from Auggie, Jai doing the same. Before she takes more than two steps, Auggie pulls her back into another tight embrace.

"Be safe," he whispers into her hair so softly Jai almost misses it.

Jai sees her smile and tries to ignore how happy a simple hug seems to make her.

"I love you too," Annie tells him, then extricates herself from his unyielding grip.

Jai thinks Auggie's delaying them just to be cheeky. Or, maybe Auggie doesn't care about displaying his affection for Annie in front of others. Jai wishes the two of them would move out of the honeymoon phase they seem to be lingering in.

Auggie lifts and turns his head in the direction of his office doorway, addressing Jai as closely as he's able to. Jai has to admit that the man is pretty precise when it comes to target location; it's always impressed him.

"I'll update you with any changes to Kate Harris' whereabouts," Auggie informs him.

"We'll be in touch," Jai states as means of saying goodbye.

* * *

><p>Jai's hand loosely grips the bottom of the steering wheel, tugging it slightly in either direction when the highway curves. They've been on the road for two hours now, with only a short distance left to go.<p>

_Crunch_.

The sound of chewing draws his attention from the road and Jai glances over at his partner.

Annie is still nibbling at the granola bar she grabbed from her desk before they left the DPD. The wrapper crinkles as she lowers the half-eaten bar back into her lap and reaches for the Styrofoam cup of coffee in the dashboard holder. She barely touches the lid to her lips before she puts it back. It has to be unpleasantly cold by now.

"Is there a reason you're eating like a squirrel?" Jai asks. He's never known her to have a small appetite. At Allen's she can wolf down a hamburger with as much speed and flair as any of her male counterparts.

"My stomach's been giving me issues." Her tone suggests that he not ask her any other questions about the state of her health.

She stows the second half of her granola bar in the bottom of her duffel bag at her feet. Then she pulls out a pair of sneakers and trades her heels in for some more practical, mission-appropriate footwear.

Jai can't leave the topic alone and takes a roundabout way of asking if she's all right. He needs to know if she's sick enough for it to affect the impending mission. If his partner is compromised in any way, he should know about it in advance.

"If you need me to pull over," he offers, "let me know."

"I should be fine," she assures him in a firm voice. "It's just a bug. No big deal."

Her insistence reassures him a little and he falls silent.

When they pass the "Welcome to Yorktown" sign, Annie pulls out her cell phone and dials Auggie's extension to check in and get an update on the robbers' location. She puts the phone on speaker.

"You're just getting into the city limits now?" Auggie asks when he answers. "What are you clocking? Thirty miles an hour?"

"Jai's a responsible driver," Annie says, smirking in her partner's direction. Jai can practically see the air quotes around the word 'responsible.'

"I guess I don't know what a responsible driver is," Auggie teases her. "Not when you're my usual chauffeur , anyway."

"You better watch yourself, mister," she warns. "You'll be taking the metro to work if you keep it up."

He laughs. "Jai, I've been driving with you before. Where'd your lead foot go?"

"You want me to bring your girlfriend back in one piece, don't you?" Jai asks.

"You'd better or—"

"Can we get back to that update?" Annie interrupts. "Where are we going?"

"Harris' cell phone signal is coming from the Navy Cargo and Handling Port Group in Yorktown," he reports dutifully. "I'm sending the exact coordinates to your GPS."

"Is there any other information?" Jai asks.

"Joan's had Stu looking into Kate Harris. The only blip in her background was a summer session at a technical university in Moscow. Other than that, she's the all-American G.N.S."

"What Girl Next Door would steal top secret documents?" Annie asks.

"I know one who's on her way to do just that," Auggie says, "except she's stealing them back."

Jai puts an end to their banter with a question. "You think Harris is trying to sell the senator's files to the Russians?"

"Possible, but not confirmed." Auggie sounds skeptical. "But, if an international intelligence cell is behind the robbery, things could be more complicated than we originally thought."

"We'll be careful," Annie responds to his unspoken warning. "Anything else?"

"That's it from my end."

"We're coming up to the cargo yard now," Jai says, wrapping up the phone call.

"Joan's seen to it that your names are on the personnel list. You shouldn't have any trouble getting in."

"Thanks, Auggie," Annie says, then ends the call.

* * *

><p>As promised, the security checkpoints don't pose any problems; Jai and Annie make their way onto the Naval Shipping Port without any questions asked. According to the tracking signal on Kate Harris' cell phone, she and her accomplice are making their exchange on a barge at the end of the pier.<p>

Not wanting to alert the robbers to their presence, Jai parks the car a little more than halfway down the pier behind a large Dumpster—the only cover available since Friday evening means few cars are left in the parking spaces dotted along the pier.

Jai gets out of the car, opens the trunk and unlocks the briefcase with their tech while Annie changes out of her suit jacket and pulls on a black sweater that allows her to move more freely. He puts the earpiece in, hiding the radio in his suit jacket. This mission is low tech, which means no fancy or wireless gadgets. But he's okay with that; Jai's always liked things old-school style.

"Com-links are go," he says, pressing the microphone on the earpiece.

"Copy that," Auggie responds. "You are obnoxiously loud and clear."

"Yeah, hearing your voice makes me all giddy inside too, Anderson."

"Careful. My ego's about to burst as it is. Your flattery might just be the needle."

Jai exhales in a short laugh, then grabs Annie's com-link and walks around the car to give it to her. He sees her bent over, heaving and gripping her midsection. Nothing appears to be coming up, but that probably has to do with the fact that she hasn't eaten much recently.

"Hey, you all right?"

After a few more dry heaves, Annie straightens and smoothes down her hair.

"I told you, it's just a stomach bug."

Something in her voice makes him think she's a bit more worried about a so called 'stomach bug' than she should be. But he doesn't dwell on it. They have a job to do. If she says she'll be fine, he trusts her.

Jai grabs a bottle of water from the front seat and hands it to her. She rinses out her mouth and spits on the ground.

"Thanks," she says. "I'm good now. Give me my com."

"Are you sure?"

"I don't know why you and Auggie are making this such a big deal. I'm fine." She takes the com-link and puts it in her ear. "If we don't move quickly, we could lose that flash-drive. I'm not going to have the deaths of countless undercover operatives on my conscience."

Jai nods as Annie tucks the rest of the audio and tracking equipment into a small black backpack before slinging it over her shoulders. After they have everything they need, Jai closes up the car and they start making their way down the pier toward the last barge.

Annie presses her hand to her ear and tells Auggie, "We're going in."

* * *

><p>They split up once they get onto the barge; Jai goes to the left, making his way along the outside of the boxcar rows, while Annie goes up the middle of the barge, in between the aisles of shipping containers.<p>

Joan comes in over their headsets: "Auggie has an infrared satellite on your position. It looks like there are four people on that ship with you."

"Any idea who the buyers are?" Jai asks.

"No," she responds. "Annie? We need you to get audio on the exchange."

"I'll be within range in a minute," Annie says.

Auggie's voice comes on now, "Your best bet is to get on top of one of those shipping containers. The sound will be clearer that way. Can you do that?"

It takes her a moment to answer. "I think so."

"Good," Joan says.

Jai is close enough to hear voices now, though he can't distinguish what's being said. The fact that they're outnumbered and out-armed makes him nervous. Even if they manage to get the better of their adversaries, chances are that one or more of the bad guys will get away this time. The perfectionist in him fights to come up with a foolproof plan that ends with Annie and himself walking away alive and with the flash-drive in their possession.

Rounding the corner, Jai's eyes catch an anomaly on the side of the boxcar a hundred feet in front of him. Slowly, he makes his way closer, crossing one foot over the other and walking sideways as he keeps his back parallel with the containers behind him.

"I'm at the end of the boxcar," Annie whispers in his ear. "Setting up audio now."

Jai keeps moving closer to the last box car in the row as the conversation continues. At fifty feet away, he sees a red dot blinking on the small rectangular object that sticks out from the rest of the boxcar. His stomach drops and he starts to sweat, his instincts telling him what he's seeing is not good.

In another moment foreign voices fill their headsets; none of them sound very happy.

"You told us two million," a man's voice says.

"We were expecting delivery three days ago," a different man answers in a thick accent.

"There were complications, Mr. Derveko," a woman says. "We're still delivering on our promise. We expect payment in kind."

Jai is twenty feet away from the device now. He sees wires leading down the side of the metal container and out of sight. Adrenaline starts pumping into his bloodstream, already prepping him should his instincts be correct.

At five feet he confirms the worst: Annie is setting up microphones and recording equipment across from a boxcar that's been rigged with a hefty charge of C4.

"Annie," Jai whispers into his com-link, trying to keep the panic he feels out of his voice. "Get out of there. Do it quickly, calmly, and most importantly, do it quietly."

Annie doesn't respond to his order. "Walker?" he asks.

"What's going on out there?" Auggie asks through his headset. "Tell me what you see."

"There's a block of C4 plastered to the side of a boxcar."

A loud clang sounds to Jai's right. Unfortunately, Jai's not the only one who hears it.

"What was that?" the thick accent asks. "You are trying to deceive us?"

"No, Mr. Derevko," Kate says, "W-we must have been followed."

"I do not believe you. Give us the flash-drive now!" the Russian commands.

"Not until we get our money!" Kate's accomplice yells.

The shouting match continues in his ear as Jai trots back along the boxcars, trying to distance himself from the blast zone. Even a small charge of C4 can cause a major explosion, and the charge he saw was not small.

"Annie? Are you out?" Auggie asks the question this time.

Again, she doesn't answer. Jai knows that it had to be Annie who made the noise that set off the Russians, but he doesn't know where she's disappeared to.

"Annie?" he asks.

"I'm on the ground now," Annie's voice finally breaks through, "between the first two rows of boxcars. I have visual of the Russians. I'm going in to get that flash-drive."

"No!" Auggie's voice comes through the com-link. "You're sitting on a charge of C4. Think, Annie. You need to get out of there."

"We need that flash-drive!"

Joan's voice joins the dissension. "Walker, fall back."

"But. . ."

"That's a non-negotiable order."

The shouting match between the Russians and the traitors continues to escalate, but Jai stops listening to what they're actually saying. Just from the enraged tones, he can tell things are about to go bad.

Just as the thought enters Jai's mind, all hell breaks loose. The bomb is detonated and Jai's world is thrown into complete chaos. The searing blast from the C4 knocks him off his feet and sends him sprawling backwards, dropping him ten feet from where he was just standing.

Jai lands hard on his side. A sharp pain accompanies his first breath; he thinks at least two of his ribs on his left side are broken. Bits of metal leave holes in his clothing, a few pieces nicking his skin and drawing blood. His face and arms burn with heat; the air around him is too hot to open his eyes immediately.

His eyes water from exposure and pain as he pushes himself to his feet. He can't stand completely upright and holds onto his left side. Jai turns in a circle, disoriented from the explosion and the aftermath.

His hearing may be severely compromised from the explosion, but he can hear Auggie shouting in his ear.

One name falls from the techie's mouth over and over: "Annie!"

Jai scans the scene, looking for his partner—the partner who was closer to the explosion. Hobbling along the aisle, he finally sees her through the clearing smoke.

"Oh god," he mumbles.

He makes his way over to the woman who's sitting half-slumped, half-upright against a partially destroyed shipping container, the contents of which are still burning. The explosion must have thrown her against the boxcar.

"Oh god," he repeats when he sees the large piece of shrapnel sticking out from her lower abdomen. He kneels beside her. "Annie!"

Auggie's voice breaks in. "What happened? Dammit, Jai, talk to me!"

Annie's eyes are open and wide. Even though she's looking in Jai's direction, he can tell she's not really seeing him. Her hands are pressed against her stomach, stained a crimson red by her own blood. Her hands, arms, and lips tremble from pain and shock.

"Jai!" Auggie shouts. He hears Joan trying to calm Auggie down in the background, but her voice is weak in comparison to the man yelling for Jai's attention.

Jai quickly assesses the situation and says, "Auggie, we need a chopper. Right now. Annie needs to be airlifted out of here."

As if to see what's wrong with her, Annie glances down and whimpers at the sight of the foreign object that's pierced her abdomen. Her hands move from the mouth of the wound to the shard of shrapnel.

For some reason that Jai's never been able to understand, trauma victims always try to remove the object that has invaded their bodies; he's aware it's the most common mistake that leads to death in impalement cases. Jai's hands stop her from pulling the metal shard out. He can't let Annie kill herself. If she removes it, she'll bleed out before they can get her to a hospital. She's already lost so much blood.

"No, Annie. It has to stay there."

"It's gotta come out. It's gotta come out." Her voice is panicked and breathy.

"Not yet," he tells her, pulling her hands off of the shard and pressing them back to the wound, putting as much pressure on it as he dares.

Her blood is thick and warm on his fingers—a sharp contrast to the icy touch of her hands beneath his.

"Auggie, we need that chopper now!" Jai yells.

"Auggie?" Annie repeats. Now her voice is weak, her eyes even more unfocused.

"Stay with me, Annie," Jai orders.

Joan's voice comes over the com-link. "The chopper is airborne."

Jai earnestly listens for the sound of the chopper's blades as he watches Annie slowly lose consciousness and the color drain from her face.

Blood is everywhere. It's all he sees, all he feels and smells. It smells like death.

"C'mon, Annie," Jai whispers.

He tries to calculate how much blood she's lost to determine how much time she has left to live. The numbers are grim.

He estimates that she's lost almost two quarts of blood.

The average human body only has six.

* * *

><p><strong>Oh no! A cliffhanger? Yep, I'm that type. Don't hate me too much for it. ;) <strong>

**What did you think? Let me know by hitting that review button!**

**Title for Part Three is: "Bombs and Shells."**

**Note: Updates. I'm a bit ahead, so I'll update twice a week until I run out of material. Then, we'll see. I'll shoot for Tuesdays/Thursdays. :)**

**Thanks for reading!  
><strong>


	3. Bombs and Shells

**All right, everyone. Here's part three. We're back in Annie's head for this one. I hope you enjoy.**

**Note: I'm not a medical professional, but I've done my best to research. If I've made a gross error or you have suggestions, I'd appreciate it. :)  
><strong>

**Commence angst! ;)**

* * *

><p><em>Part Three: Bombs and Shells<em>

Annie regains her senses one at a time. She hears her own deep, even breathing over the dim buzz of florescent lighting. The air she inhales smells like industrial-strength disinfectant mixed with a combination of singed hair and freshly laundered sheets.

She can feel some sort of cover laying over the lower half of her body. It helps to keep her warm, though her uncovered forearms are freezing. Annie can't find the energy or strength to move them underneath the covers; she can't even find the strength to open her eyes. She concentrates all her efforts on forcing her heavy eyelids to open—and succeeds in making her left thumb twitch. She groans inwardly, unable to produce any real sound.

Annie tries to swallow, but her mouth is dry. She opens her mouth slightly and breathes in, trying to extract a bit of moisture from the air around her. When she manages to make her throat contract, she can taste the medication running through her body and goes back to breathing through her nose.

She wishes she could remember how she ended up in a hospital. A series of images comes into her head, but they're jumbled and hazy.

She and Jai had arrived in Yorktown and gone to the Naval Shipyard. There was a barge with rows of towering boxcars. She remembers crawling along the top of one of those boxcars, then Jai shouting. There were other voices shouting too, louder than Jai. Everything after that is a dark, chaotic blur.

And pain. Annie remembers the pain.

After fifteen minutes of more failed attempts to open her eyes, Annie finally gets them to flutter open and shut. She pushes herself harder and is rewarded with a longer time between blinks. Finally, she's able to keep her eyes open and see her environment. The first thing she notices once her eyes adjust to the blinding brightness of the hospital room is the man reclined in a chair next to her bed.

"Aug. . .gie."

She doesn't know how he hears her broken, almost whispered word—she barely produces any sound because her throat is so dry. But, somehow, her nearly inaudible whisper makes him stir and sit upright.

"Annie?" he asks, feeling along her mattress until he touches her forearm. Just hearing his voice brings her immense comfort, even if it's shaky. Annie sees the wetness in his eyes and hates that she's the one who caused those tears.

She wants to say something. She _tries_ to say something, anything. But the exhaustion she feels and the lack of moisture in her mouth keep her from making any other sounds.

"It's okay," Auggie says as if sensing her attempts. "Rest up some more. Save your strength. I'll be here."

His thumb traces the ridge of her middle finger, each repetition shifting from a gentle to firm pressure. Before her grogginess can overtake her, Annie musters all the energy she has left and squeezes his fingers in an effort to ease his worry.

Then her world fades back to black.

* * *

><p>When she wakes up again, Auggie's chair is empty.<p>

It takes a moment for it to register that there is another person in the room: Joan Campbell. Her boss stands at the window, looking pensive with her hands clasped behind her back and her mouth set in a thoughtful line.

Annie doesn't make any effort to call out to Joan, but eventually the older woman turns and sees that her injured agent is no longer sleeping.

"Annie," she remarks, "you're awake."

Annie looks pointedly at the empty chair and breathes out, "Where's Auggie?"

Her throat is even scratchier than before, but she feels a little stronger. Joan walks around her bed to a small table, pours a glass of water and places the cup and straw in front of Annie's lips. Annie takes a refreshing drink as Joan explains:

"I sent Auggie to get something to eat and coffee. He's been sitting here since you came out of surgery."

Annie pulls away from the straw and asks, "How long ago was that?"

Joan places the cup back on the table and glances at her slender wristwatch. "Nearly sixteen hours ago."

Annie's blown away by how long she's been out.

Joan sits on the edge of her bed, though she doesn't appear to be comfortable. "Annie, do you remember what happened?"

She shakes her head.

Joan nods as though she expected as much. Her boss's composure helps to keep Annie calm.

"You and Jai were pursuing Kate Harris and her accomplice, who we now know is a man named Jack Benson. There was an explosion on the barge you and Jai were surveying."

"An explosion," Annie repeats. It sounds vaguely familiar and completely possible.

"The Russians had attached a bomb onto one of the shipping containers. They'd intended to set it off once they'd exchanged the flash-drive for money, so that they could kill Harris and Benson."

"That way they'd keep their money and the intel."

"Right," Joan says.

Annie tries to remember the explosion, but the details are still fuzzy.

Joan helps her. "When the Russians spooked, we believe they decided to detonate the C4 in order to get away. There was no way we could have predicted it."

The door of her room opens and Auggie steps in just as she asks, "Is Jai alive?"

"He had two broken ribs, some cuts, and minor burns, but he's doing okay," Joan answers.

"And me?"

"I'll go get the doctor," Joan says, standing and moving toward the door, "so he can explain everything. He'll want to know you're awake."

Auggie finds his way over to his chair and drags it closer to her bedside before sitting down.

"Hey," he says.

"Hey."

Auggie reaches out and takes her hand in his again. His touch is warm and soothing.

"I'm sorry I wasn't here when you woke up."

Annie smiles at his unnecessary apology. "Joan told me you've been here since I got out of the OR. You don't have to apologize."

He lifts her hand to the side of his face. The stubble of his unshaven jaw chafes the palm of her hand, but the rough texture is pleasant. Auggie turns his head and kisses her palm, then lowers their joined hands back to her hospital bed.

"Annie. . ." Auggie starts, his voice suddenly gruff and choked with emotion.

"Shh. . ." she coos. "I'm okay."

"Just the thought. . .the thought. . ."

She knows what he's trying to say and understands why it's such a difficult thing to voice; just the thought of losing Auggie is too much for her to put into words too. Annie squeezes his hand as hard as she can.

The moment of loaded silence between them is interrupted by the sound of footsteps and voices approaching her room. Joan enters the room first with the doctor following close behind her. Auggie straightens at the intrusion, but Annie doesn't move.

"Well, Ms. Walker," the doctor begins, "it's good to see that you're awake."

Annie doesn't respond, so Joan says, "Auggie, why don't we give Annie and Dr. Snyder a moment to talk?"

From her tone, Annie can tell that Joan's question is more of an order.

"Go," Annie says before Auggie can protest. "We'll just be a few minutes."

Auggie doesn't look pleased at being excluded from the upcoming conversation, but he stands anyway. He leans over Annie's bed and snuggles his face against her neck, inhaling deeply. With her left hand, Annie caresses the back of his head.

"Even after major surgery, you still smell like Jo Malone."

"I love you," she whispers against his ear.

"I love you too, Annie," he responds. He kisses her forehead, the tip of her nose, and finally places a chaste kiss on her lips before pulling away.

Auggie grips Joan's elbow as they leave, and Annie watches until they turn the corner before she gives her attention back to the doctor.

"I had surgery?" she asks to start the conversation.

"Yes, for nearly four hours," Dr. Snyder tells her. "The shrapnel ruptured a part of your small intestine and punctured your uterus. It took us quite a while to repair the internal damage and remove all the metal shards."

At his explanation, her hands touch her lower stomach for the first time. Even underneath the covers, she can tell that thick bandages cover her skin. "But, I'm okay?"

"Yes," he says hesitantly.

Annie frowns. "There's something you're not telling me."

The doctor seems impressed that she caught onto his omission. "There is one more thing, Ms. Walker."

He inches closer to her bed, clasping his clipboard in front of him. Annie doesn't like the professionally perfected look of sympathy on his face.

"What is it?" she asks.

"Ms. Walker, were you aware that you were pregnant?"

Annie's mouth drops open, her body pushing out all the air in her lungs. The phrase 'caught off-guard' doesn't begin to describe her reaction. She closes her eyes then opens them again, wondering if this is real; she very nearly pinches herself. There had been times over the past week or so that she thought maybe. . .

No. It isn't possible. She and Auggie have always taken precautions.

Aware the Dr. Snyder is staring at her, she slowly shakes her head. A heavy pressure begins building inside the cavity of her chest, pushing against her ribcage and up into her throat. Her brain is still busy processing the doctor's use of the past tense.

Annie's left hand runs over the heavily bandaged curve of her lower abdomen. The swell of pressure gets bigger, blocking off her windpipe. Barely enough oxygen passes through her nose to keep her breathing.

Dr. Snyder tilts his head to the side in a gesture of sympathy. He seems to be seriously considering his next words, and while Annie appreciates his sincere concern, she'd rather he tell her straight out and then leave her alone.

His body language gives away what he's about to say. Even before the doctor opens his mouth again, tears spill over the rims of her eyes. They are an automated response. Annie's not entirely sure why they're present. Shock, she surmises. She must be going into shock.

"I'm afraid we weren't able to save the fetus," the doctor informs her. "There was simply too much damage to the outside uterine walls. I'm sorry. There was too much trauma to save the pregnancy."

She's still trying to figure out how this happened. "How far along was I?"

"It's hard to determine. Not very far," he responds. "Four, maybe six weeks."

She swallows hard and fights with the tears. All she can manage is a nod of acknowledgement. Her body suddenly feels cold. The fingers touching her stomach feel like ice even through the covers of her hospital bed.

"The good news," the doctor continues, "is that we didn't have to perform a hysterectomy. We were able to repair the uterine walls."

"What does that mean?" she asks with difficulty. There's a ringing in her ears. It's so loud that she can barely hear what the doctor is saying.

"It means that there's a possibility that you could still have a normal, healthy pregnancy in the future." He's quick to add, "I can't make you any promises though."

"Is that it?" Annie asks, trying to stay collected.

He nods.

"Could you leave me alone for a few minutes? Please?"

The pressure inside of her is about to burst, and she doesn't want anyone around when that happens, especially a doctor who reports to her boss.

"Certainly. If you need anything, just call for the nurses."

Dr. Snyder steps out and closes the door behind him. He takes her air of calmness with him.

Annie's body begins twitching, almost seizing with the effort not to cry. She fights with herself and her emotions, trying to push the mixed and confused feelings back inside herself. Annie holds everything in, making her tremble like a boiling kettle that's ready to let loose a shrill whistle of steam as the pressure finds little holes through which to escape.

"Auggie. . ." Annie half-cries, half-whispers.

What will she tell Auggie? How can she tell him she lost their child?

The thought of how he'll react to the loss—of how he'll react to learning that she was pregnant in the first place—is finally too much for her to handle.

Annie muffles her cries by clamping both hands across her mouth and nose. If she can't breathe, she can't cry, can't scream.

* * *

><p>All too soon, Annie hears muffled voices approaching her door. One sounds angry, the other two trying to calm the first.<p>

Annie quickly wipes the shoulder cuff of her hospital gown across her eyes, trying to conceal the evidence of her breakdown. Auggie might not be able to see her, but if Joan comes in, Annie can't let her boss see how disheveled she is.

The door flies open and Auggie fills the doorway. She sees him take a calming breath before tapping his cane over to her bed.

"Auggie," Joan's warning tone carries from the hallway.

Joan steps into the doorway and stops. She makes eye contact with Annie but quickly looks away, then shuts the door to Annie's room before turning and walking back down the hall with the doctor.

"Annie?" Auggie asks softly, reaching out a hand to rest on her shoulder.

"Don't," she says. It's clear in her voice that she's been crying, but she can't hide it now. "Don't touch me. Please."

He backs off, appearing confused by her behavior. She can't explain why she doesn't want to be touched right now either.

"Annie, what is it? Dr. Snyder and Joan aren't telling me anything."

"Auggie. . ." she whispers. The sound is broken. She sees his face pale at her tone.

"Tell me, Annie. We'll get through it, whatever it is."

"It's not the kinda thing you can just say."

The apprehensive look on Auggie's face forces her to collect herself; she doesn't want to scare him. It kills her to hurt him, which is exactly what she's going to do to him by revealing what Dr. Snyder told her.

Her tears have finally stopped. Inside her chest, the pressure is starting to ebb. It slowly disperses to her entire body, filling her with the sensation of numbness. She's completely motionless except for her fists clutching the sheets of her hospital bed so tightly that her nails bite into the skin of her palms.

"Please, Annie."

"I don't know how."

"Just say it."

Annie is glad that he can't see her right now, glad that he can't see what an utter mess she is. She takes as deep a breath as possible.

"There's no baby." Her words still come out shaky, uneven.

Auggie gropes the air behind him until he finds his chair, then sits down.

"'No baby'?" he repeats like she's speaking a foreign language.

"I'm sorry, Auggie. I'm so sorry."

"Wait a minute," he says. "Back up. Let's start with: You were pregnant?" He sounds completely perplexed.

"I didn't know. It was so early in the first trimester, I didn't know," she explains.

He rests his elbows on his knees and puts his head into the palms of his hands. Annie watches him for a moment to see how he's reacting to the news, but after a few seconds she has to turn away. She can't stand to see the pained expression on his face and watch the way his bottom lip trembles in grief or anger—she's not sure which.

Seeing his pain almost makes her wish she was blind. Just thinking that makes her feel so guilty that she wants to curl into herself and disappear. She tests it out, but the bandages on her stomach prevent her from doing any more than bending her knees.

"How could this happen?" he asks softly.

Annie owes him an explanation. She slides her arms across herself and crosses them over her stomach, squeezing until she can feel a twinge of pain over the pain killers, over her numbness.

"The shrapnel. . ." she starts, then chokes up. "The doctor said they couldn't save it."

Auggie shakes his head and stands up. He starts pacing, but he bumps into the edge of her bed, then almost knocks over the various monitors and IV stand, and stops moving. She can see that his anguish is slowly giving way to anger.

"How could you not know? How could you not know you were pregnant?"

The accusation in his voice shuts her down. She gives him a vocal screensaver.

"I'm so sorry, Auggie. So sorry."

She repeats the phrase in varying volumes and tones of distress. She should have known. She should have.

"Annie, I didn't mean to snap at you," he says after a lengthy pause, lowering himself onto the space at the foot of her bed.

She forces her body to curl up and away from him, trying to put as much distance between them as possible. Turning onto her side, Annie continues to hold herself around her midsection. If she lets go, she might fall apart.

He reaches out and lays a gentle hand on her left calf. Auggie squeezes her leg slightly but doesn't say anything. What is there to say?

The tears return to her eyes, but this time they are not caused by shock or sadness. Their presence is caused by Annie's shame; she's ashamed because she finds more comfort in the pain stemming out from the wound in her abdomen than she does in Auggie's touch.

The room is still and quiet except for the soft sound of her suppressed crying and the beeping of the monitors.

* * *

><p><strong>Should I go and take cover now? Are you going to flip out on me for what I've done? Or are you like me and revel in the angst? ;)<strong>

**Next chapter is titled "Exposed" and is from Auggie's POV. Hope you'll stick around and check it out.**

**How about a comment? Love it? Hate it? Wondering where I'm going with this? Let me know!  
><strong>


	4. Exposed

**Oh, man. I about had a heart attack last night because I somehow managed to erase all 392 documents from my computer while trying to backup my files. Note to self: never mix alcohol and technology. Seriously. So, apologies that this update is a day later than normal, but I'm happy it's here at all. When I realized I couldn't find the files on my laptop, all I could think of was this story. That would have been tragic. Just thinking about it almost brought me to tears, haha.  
><strong>

**Anywho, here's part four from Auggie's POV. I hope you like it. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p><em>Part Four: Exposed<em>

The cold glass of the cab window is soothing against Auggie's forehead. Even if he could see, he'd be doing what he's doing now—keeping his eyes averted from Annie—because the awkward, tense silence in the backseat of the cab is too much to handle at the moment. Two weeks of traveling to and from the hospital, alternately comforting and arguing with Annie, have completely depleted his energy stores and left him so internally conflicted that he doesn't know what to feel or think anymore.

He shouldn't have snapped at her. He should have controlled himself.

As he presses his head against the window, Auggie thinks of homecomings. He's not particularly fond of them, given the experiences he's had.

Within the CIA, every homecoming is bittersweet. Every time an operative returns home, they've changed in some capacity—sometimes for the better, sometimes not.

Most, thankfully, come home as better agents. They've learned something from their mission. They're stronger, smarter and more informed of what it means to be an agent and what makes a good one. Practice and experience are the foundations for a wise, seasoned operative.

But sometimes they come back scarred, beaten. Blind. Or they turn cynical, viewing the world as hopeless. They see the Agency for what it is—a corrupted bureaucracy—and can't take it.

Other times the trauma agents suffer is psychological; Auggie has seen more than a few colleagues resign from the Agency after exposure to torture or other grotesque terrors. He doesn't blame them for wanting out. No one does.

Sometimes agents come back in a coffin draped in stars and stripes. Some don't come home at all.

The commonality with all CIA missions and homecomings is that an agent may return, but they are never the same person as when they left. Auggie knows firsthand; he's permanently marked by the unexpected mishap that led to his unscheduled return trip to the States. That's one homecoming he wishes he could erase from his memory altogether.

He's not sure what classification Annie's homecoming falls into. It certainly isn't pleasant thus far.

The cab continues navigating the city streets, bringing them closer to his apartment building. Auggie's not sure he's prepared to deal with Annie's return just yet. He hardly knows how to cope with all of his own emotions and has only begun to process the consequences of the barge explosion. He's not sure how he's going to manage being Annie's major support with everything he's experiencing, even if that's all he wants to be for her.

He's afraid of messing things up like he did at the hospital two weeks ago when Annie told him about losing the pregnancy. Even though he is trained to control his emotions, he's never been able to do that where Annie's concerned. She's the one person in his life that he's learned to be wholly honest with. He'd gotten so used to that honesty that he couldn't hold himself back when he needed to the most.

Now she won't tell him anything. For two weeks, she's been completely closed off to him and his attempts to apologize. They've had minor tiffs before, but nothing like this. Nothing with such severe consequences.

There's so much at stake, so much more he could lose if he doesn't get a handle on things. But his lack of experience with this type of grief makes solving the problems that much more difficult. Auggie's never had to think about these kinds of things before—at least not to this extent.

He's still struggling to think about the situation rationally. But if he wants to help Annie, he has to somehow control his emotions and be the voice of reason. Trouble is, he's no longer an uninvolved third party that can give unbiased advice or words of encouragement. It was his child too. Her loss is his loss.

Of course he's beyond happy and relieved that she's alive. Of course he's glad that she's been released from the hospital. Of course he's happy to have her back. He wouldn't have it any other way. But, there's also a knot of trepidation sitting heavily in the middle of his gut, because what the hell is he supposed to do now? All he wants is to help Annie through this time of grief, but he doesn't know any of the steps to begin making it right.

His one hope is that he doesn't screw this up.

* * *

><p>The cab pulls up to his apartment building and they make their way up to the third floor in silence. Annie doesn't offer her arm to help guide him up the stairs. It's unusual behavior, but not completely unexpected. Even without her help, he climbs the stairs beside her with little hesitance, his left hand pressed against the wall for reassurance. Annie keeps herself as far from him as possible; he can hear her hand skimming along the wall to her right, her nails scratching against the textured paint. There might only be an inch or two of space between their shoulders, but it might as well be miles—he's sure her mind is miles away, probably still stuck in Yorktown on that barge, wondering where it all went wrong.<p>

As soon as Auggie slides the apartment door shut, Annie whispers, "I'm going to take a shower."

It's the first time she's spoken to him since they left the hospital. Her voice is just as distant as her body. She's standing right next to him, but she's somewhere else entirely.

"Okay."

Auggie prays that she won't speak in whispers for very long. There's no life behind whispered words; they're dead sounds that pass through the air without clinging to anything. The breathy sounds make Annie's usually expressive voice sound fractured and empty. Auggie would do anything to give Annie her voice back. His ears love picking out the slight variations in her tone that tell him what kind of mood she's in. After knowing her for two years of knowing her, Auggie is so attuned to those subtle tonality differences that he can tell when she's had her morning coffee or when she's frustrated with Joan's orders; whether she is happy, sad, angry or indifferent; when she's aroused or when she's being sarcastic.

But the whispers mask the vocal cues he's so used to reading. Not being able to see her hurt expression is bad enough, but being unable to hear the pain in her voice is downright distressing.

Only the gentlest shift in the air around him tells Auggie that she's moved away from him. Even the sound of the bathroom door closing is muted.

Exhaling loudly into the empty room, Auggie goes into the bedroom, pulling his sweater over his head as he walks. He puts it in the laundry hamper and digs his cell phone out of his pocket, dialing the number of the one person he can express his panic to without feeling ashamed of his inability to handle the situation by himself.

The dial tone mingles with the sound of the running shower in Auggie's ears.

"Yello'?"

"Hi, Dad."

"What's the matter, son?"

His mother's voice comes through the receiver; she's somewhere in the near background. Auggie can picture her hovering over his father's shoulder, trying to listen in on his phone call.

"Honest to Betsy, John," she says. "What kind of question is that?"

Then Auggie hears what sounds like his mother's attempt to wrestle the phone from his father's hand before he can say anything else she deems insensitive. From the time he was little, his mother was always a very assertive woman, not to mention very protective of her youngest child.

"Calm down, Clara," his father grumbles, placing his hand over the mouthpiece but failing to block out his mini-argument with his wife. "Just calm down."

"Don't you remember why he's calling? He said he'd call when—"

"I remember," his father interrupts. "I'm not goofy in the head yet for Christ's sake."

"Let me talk to him, John," she orders.

"Maybe he doesn't want to talk to you just yet."

Hearing his parents' casual argument almost makes Auggie smile. It reminds him of when he was still living in the suburbs of northern Illinois, when he didn't have to worry about the mental health of his girlfriend and wasn't exposed to the grief of losing of a child. It reminds him of a time when life was simple.

His father's hand slides from the mouthpiece—the sound like rubbing two pieces of sandpaper together—bringing Auggie out of his little reverie.

"You wanna talk to your mother, August?"

"No, Dad," he says quickly. She's the last person he wants to speak with today, actually. "I wanted to talk to you."

His father mumbles something incomprehensible to his mother, but then his tone turns somber, confidential. "Today was the day, huh?"

"Yeah," Auggie responds shortly, sighing as he massages his temples with his free hand. "Today was the day. Annie's home."

"How is she?"

He appreciates how much calmer his father is about the topic than his mother would be. When Auggie told her about Annie's freak accident at a Smithsonian storeroom—a cover story formulated by Joan involving a shelving unit full of ancient pottery toppling over and pinning Annie beneath its weight—his mother had been overwrought with emotion. She had dissolved into sniffles and tearful words of semi-comfort when he revealed the loss of Annie's pregnancy.

But there are no waterworks or gasps of concern with his father. It's the kind of support Auggie needs right now.

"August?" his father prompts.

"She's home," he says again, his ears switching to focus on the sound of running water coming from the bathroom. "The doctor says she looks better."

According to Dr. Snyder, Annie will be healed—physically at least—in as little as two months, but Auggie's not worried about her physical injuries.

"But how is she doing? You know, what's she acting like?"

Auggie sighs again. "I don't know, Dad. I can't tell. She's scaring me."

"It's a scary thing to go through."

Auggie leans forward on the edge of the bed, hunching over with his elbows on his knees and running his free hand through the front of his hair until the heel of his hand rests on his forehead. He doesn't want to ask the question circling in his mind, because he doesn't want to bring up painful memories, but—if he's being honest with himself—it's the main reason he called his father for advice.

"What did you do, Dad? How did you get through to Mom when. . .when she miscarried?"

It's his father's turn to sigh. Auggie pictures him stroking his salt-and-pepper beard while he thinks of how to answer.

"I wish I could give you some solid advice, August, I really do. But 'time' and 'patience' are the only two words that I can throw out there."

Even if the words do little to ease his mind or help him figure out what he's going to do for Annie, at least Auggie knows that his father is there to support him. Maybe that's all he needs—to know that he's not alone and that other people have gone through what he's experiencing now. Maybe that's all Annie needs too: support, love.

"I just wish I knew how to help her," Auggie confesses.

His father is quiet for a moment, then says, "Just give Annie some time and a little space to adjust to being back home. Don't crowd her, but let her know you're there."

Auggie takes in the words and files them away. "Thanks, Dad."

"Hang in there, son."

* * *

><p>Auggie lays stretched out on the bed after hanging up with his father, caught in a web of conflicting thoughts and emotions. The clarity he was seeking by talking to his father still eludes him.<p>

The constant stream of running water from the shower slowly lulls him to sleep. He drifts off for what he thinks is only a few moments, but when he checks his watch, he realizes that he's been asleep for twenty minutes. He must have been more drained by the day's events than he originally thought.

Auggie can still hear the water running. He roughly calculates how long Annie's been in the bathroom—nearly an hour—and quickly rises from the bed, making his way to the bathroom door. It's locked.

"Annie?" he calls. "Everything okay in there?"

She doesn't respond. Auggie jiggles the door handle a little forcefully, saying, "Annie, come open the door."

He puts his ear up to the wooden barrier, listening. Water runs in a constant, uninterrupted stream, beating against the shower tiles with an unerring rhythm—there's no audible movement within the bathroom. With his ear pressed against the door he can hear another sound too: Annie's quiet sobbing.

Auggie considers his options based on his father's advice. He could just leave her be and let her cry it out. That option is quickly eliminated; he can't let Annie shoulder all the hurt by herself. He needs to show her that she's not alone, that he's here for her whether she wants him to be or not.

Luckily his bathroom door only has a privacy lock—a lock easily opened with a safety pin or needle.

Auggie heads for his bedroom closet and grabs the first shirt he touches. He feels for the Braille label that's attached to the shirt with a slender safety pin and removes it from the fabric before heading back to the bathroom.

He knocks one more time and asks her to open the door. This time when he puts his ear up to the door, he can't even make out her soft crying. Her lack of response rattles him and drives him into action.

It takes Auggie a moment to find the small hole on the knob, but once the pin slides in, he easily finds the release and presses in the mechanism, popping the lock.

As he turns the knob and swings the door open, Auggie is greeted by a blast of hot, steamy air, even though the shower water must be freezing by now. The humid air coats his bare skin, water droplets condensing along his neck and in between his shoulder blades.

He hears Annie inhale deeply, the sound startling him because it doesn't come from the direction of the shower; it comes from the direction of the bathroom sink. Auggie moves forward slowly, his feet treading on discarded clothing along the way.

"Annie?" he asks, his voice cautious but clearly concerned. He turns toward the shower and shuts off the ice cold water before facing her again.

She sniffles and Auggie roughly pinpoints her location. He reaches out until his hand taps the top of the bathroom counter, then he trails his hand down the side of the cabinet until he encounters Annie's bare shoulder. Her skin is cool to the touch and the hair that brushes against his fingers is dry.

He bends so that he's at her level, then cups her face in his hand. The wetness on her cheek gives away that she hasn't stopped crying completely. A few beads of moisture pool in the palm of his hand. He's just glad that she doesn't try to pull away from him.

Annie's voice is barely comprehensible when she speaks. "The bandages."

Even after he deciphers what she said, Auggie's still unsure of her meaning. Then her arm shifts and he hears her hand slide over the gauze bandages on her lower abdomen.

"They can't get wet," she whispers. "I forgot."

"We'll just find something to put over them," Auggie tells hers gently.

He's never seen her like this and it scares the shit out of him, which is saying a lot. Auggie was there when Annie came home from Sri Lanka, minus Ben Mercer. He saw her at what he thought was her lowest, her most depressed. But now he's not so sure. Her behavior now is much more worrisome than when Ben was killed and he doesn't completely understand where the source of her emotion is coming from. Is it grief? Anger? Something else entirely? He's beginning to think this goes deeper than the loss of the pregnancy.

Auggie runs his hand up and down her bare arm, trying to warm her up. It's the only thing he can do to comfort her because he knows words won't cut it. He learned in the hospital to not use the phrases like "everything's going to be okay"; they just caused her to cry or shout until the nurses politely asked him to leave—the reaction depending on her mood.

"I really was going to take a shower," she says.

"You can take one later. No biggie."

"I just started thinking. . ."

"About what?" He knows it's a dangerous question, but he has to try and get her talk to him.

"Everything," she responds. "Just, everything."

It wasn't the explanation he was seeking, but he nods in understanding for her benefit. Then he says, "C'mon, you're shivering. Let's get you into some pajamas and into bed. You can shower in the morning."

Auggie stands and holds out his hands until she gingerly places her hands in his, then he pulls her to her feet. Turning toward the open shelves on his left wall, he reaches for a towel. He doesn't expect her body to crash into his, nearly knocking him over. Stumbling back a few feet, he manages to catch her against him.

Annie's hands are wrapped around her own stomach, resting over her bandages so that they don't rub against his skin. Her head just reaches the crook of his neck, her breasts plastered against his chest, cemented by the steam still lingering in the air.

Auggie's arms wrap around her, squeezing tightly—maybe even too tightly—but Annie doesn't make any sign or sound of protest. There are a thousand different phrases floating through his mind, but in the end he can't voice any of them because of the lump in his throat. So he settles for holding her close, waiting until her heartbeat calms beneath his hands.

* * *

><p>He rolls over, his hand searching for the heat of her body, but it encounters nothing but empty mattress. When he realizes she's missing, he automatically starts to rise from the bed. Either Annie is getting sneakier when she gets up in the middle of the night, or he's becoming accustomed to her leaving him alone in bed. Neither are good behavioral changes.<p>

Mind still foggy with sleep, Auggie slips out of bed and inches toward the bedroom doorway. His steps are unequal and unsteady—all but negating his attempts to calculate his approximate distance traveled—but he manages to make it into the living room before he stubs his toe on the corner of an armchair.

Annie's quiet gasp of surprise mixes with his grumbled curse. Then the room is cast back into silence. Auggie waits for a full moment to see if she'll open up first or if he'll have to pry information out of her. When she doesn't speak, he realizes that he's going to have to make the initial move.

Then she surprises him by asking, "Did I wake you up?"

Her voice is quiet and to the right. He thinks she might be standing near the window; that's where he's found her previous nights. Slowly, he sways forward, careful not to come too close and corner her.

"Noticed you weren't in bed," he says. "Again."

"Sorry. Couldn't sleep."

"This is the third night this week, Annie. What's going on?"

"I don't know." Her voice sounds farther away, like she's turned back to face the window.

Auggie doesn't understand why she can't sleep for more than a few hours at a time. She never complains that she's tired, but he's sure that if he could see her face, the strain of not sleeping would be visible.

"Is it nightmares?" he asks, knowing that she's had nightmares in the past after stressful missions.

"No."

"Then what?" he asks, a fraction of the frustration he feels creeping into his voice. He needs to keep control this time.

"I don't know what's wrong with me. I just can't sleep."

He asks the question that he's been biting back all week. "Is it me?"

Her response is more delayed than her answer about the nightmares. "No."

"You hesitated," he says.

"Honestly? I just. . ..I don't think I can be around you right now, Aug."

That admission makes him panic a little. This is all his fault. "You don't mean that," he stammers. "Annie. . .please. Tell me what I'm doing wrong. I'll fix it."

"You're not doing anything wrong," she says and her voice rises above a whisper, trying to emphasize the point. It's the first time he's been able to distinguish her tone in the last week. "It's me. I'm the one who's messed up. Maybe it'd be for the best if I went and stayed with Danielle for a while."

"No, Annie," he says with force, "it wouldn't. We have to face this together. Don't you get that?"

"I do. But, I just want to be alone. I don't wanna talk about it to you or to anyone. I just want these feelings to go away." Her voice continues to gain more volume. It cracks from the effort.

This is the most she's ever said about how she feels. If he says the right things, he might be able to get the full story. He can feel the breakthrough coming. "You can't shut yourself off from the world. It's not healthy. You have to talk it out."

"There's nothing to say."

"Say how you feel. Tell me." He barely keeps the comment from sounding like a plea.

"I can't explain to you, Auggie. Not you," she adds, her voice dropping to a whisper again.

He pushes her, edging his voice with anger even though it's worked against him in the past. But he still speaks calmly when he asks, "Why? Why not?"

"Because, if you really knew how I feel. . .you'd hate me." She sounds convinced and it breaks his heart as much as it infuriates him. To think that he could ever, _ever_ hate her is absurd to the point of being offensive.

"Annie, I will _never_ hate you. Don't say stuff like that."

"I hate me. I hate myself so much, Aug."

"Why?"

"You could never understand." Her voice keeps cycling, from whispers to a hard, low growl of self-loathing. "I don't even understand it."

"Let me try. Please."

"The things that I'm feeling aren't right. I shouldn't be feeling them." Now her voice holds a bit of anger. There's fire behind her words, and even though Auggie thinks that anger is misdirected at herself, at least her voice is coming back.

"Everyone grieves differently," he assures her. He wants to encourage her, not attack her.

"Not like this," she says and she almost sounds disgusted. "What normal woman would feel relieved to lose her pregnancy?"

Auggie's eyes open wide, his eyebrows stretching for his hairline. Out of all the responses she could have given, he had not been expecting that one at all. It wasn't even on his radar.

Annie continues, "See? I'm terrible. I'm a terrible, terrible person."

"Annie. . ."

"What's wrong with me? It's not right!" she shouts, then adds in a whisper, "It's not right."

He doesn't know what to say. He's still a little shell shocked at her admission. But Annie's on a roll now and it doesn't seem like she's going to stop until it's all in the open. It's like everything she's held back these past two weeks is finally spilling through in one flood.

"Auggie, you can't understand how much guilt I have for feeling like that. I've thought about it until I've made myself sick, but I can't help how I feel. I'm so sorry."

She's crying now, but without being able to see her, he can't tell if the tears are rooted in sadness or anger.

"I know how much you want kids, Auggie," she chokes out. "I know how much having a family means to you. But I'm not ready for that step yet. I'm not even ready to get married."

"I know," he mumbles because he feels the need to say something. They've talked about the future before, but they thought they had more time. There's been no rush in their relationship.

She takes a moment, trying to compose herself. "If things had worked out differently, I would've loved our child. I would've been beyond happy." She sounds like his normal Annie having a bad day.

"I know you would've," he assures her. "I would've too."

They fall back into silence, but something has changed. There isn't as much tension. They can both breathe again.

Auggie creeps forward and reaches out, gently touching her shoulder. Annie responds by turning in his arms so that she's facing him and he closes his arms around her. He feels tears against his skin and moves one hand to the back of her head in order to hold her closer to him.

Annie's knees wobble and soon his arms are the only things holding her up. As gently as possible, he lowers both of them into a kneeling position on the area carpet in his living room.

"Shh. . ." he breathes into her hair. "We'll be okay."

It's the first time he feels confident about that statement. It's the first time Annie doesn't disagree.

* * *

><p><strong>I did some tweaking of this chapter after some of the comments I got on part three. I'm happy with it. Hopefully it wasn't too angsty. ;) But if it was, part five won't be as angsty, promise. By the way, that part is titled: "Support Beams." If the technology gods don't curse me, it should be up on Tuesday. :)<br>**

**Please take a moment to tell me you're still here and that I'm doing something right. Pretty please?  
><strong>


	5. Support Beams

**I don't know what happened with that last chapter, but I'll be honest and say I thought about pulling the plug on this project. . . .That said, this chapter is for Zoraya. Thanks for your continued support. Without it, I don't know if I would have continued to post. :)**

**In this chap we've got a little bit of angst, a little bit of romance, and an appearance from Danielle. I hope you enjoy it! Sorry it's a little long. I'm trying to cut them down. So far, not working.  
><strong>

**Note: From Annie's POV. Starting to see the pattern? Ha.**

**Warning: The last section probably warrants an M rating, but I'm not changing it. If you have a problem with sex, stop reading after they get into bed together. M'kay? ;)**

* * *

><p><em>Part Five: Support Beams<em>

It is said that time heals.

At least, people keep telling her that. Her doctors, her sister, even the women whose stories she's read on the Internet. All of them reiterate the same basic principle: everything gets better with time.

The only voice missing in the echoed blanket statement is Auggie's. He doesn't promise that she will get better in a few months, that everything will return to normal in a year. Maybe it's because he knows that the concept of time as medicine is a fallacy.

Time doesn't cure all.

Auggie has experienced the truth about time and its relation to recovery. He knows that it is not proportional. A longer recovery does not necessarily equal a full recovery. No matter how much time passes, Auggie will never regain his sight. The years ahead of him will only teach him to cope, to adapt to the new life that has been forced on him.

Annie only hopes that she can adapt as well as he has. Like Auggie, she wants to learn to take a weakness, a loss, and somehow emerge stronger than ever before.

The placebo in her hand marks the halfway point in the process. With the last of the sugar pills, Annie is one month into her recovery, four weeks closer to the circled date in her calendar. Only twenty-eight days separate her and her greatest desires: normalcy, routine, clockwork. _Work_.

Thinking of her job as routine or normal makes her smile. It's the indeterminable aspect of her job that makes it routine; she expects to deal with unknown dangers and situations every day. Throwing herself back to into that unpredictable world is her end goal. At times—when she has moments of doubt or is overwhelmed by the grief and guilt—getting back to her job is all that matters. She needs something to look forward to, to focus on instead of the negative thoughts, the images that come to her mind unexpected and unbidden.

Slowly, Annie is learning to regain control of the rogue emotions that habitually caught her off guard over the past weeks. They would hit her at the strangest, most inappropriate moments. Tears would appear when she shopped for groceries or when she watched late-night talk show hosts repeat tired jokes. Now she's retraining herself to compartmentalize those emotions again. Otherwise, she'll never pass the psych evaluation Joan is requiring her to take before returning to work. Doing her job well depends on her ability to mask her emotions. She also hopes that controlling the random outbursts will keep Auggie from continually suggesting she go to therapy.

"_I'm just saying that it could help."_

"_I don't want a shrink."_

"_Don't keep internalizing what you're feeling."_

"_I'm coping just fine, thanks."_

"_No, Annie, you're not."_

"_What do _you_ know?"_

"_I know how much talking to a therapist helped after I lost my sight. I know it could do the same for you, if you give it a chance."_

Even if he has a point—even if he's speaking from experience—Annie is hesitant. Sure, talking with a shrink works for some people. She's not trying to discredit the whole field of study. But she's convinced that it won't do her any good. Every other challenge life has put in her way was handled without outside help. She'd had her sister when their mother died; she'd had Auggie when Ben died. If they were enough to get her through those difficult times, they are enough now. No stranger, certified or not, is going to help Annie more than the people around her, the people who know her.

Annie swallows the placebo without water and pulls on her tennis shoes. Her body is still sore from yesterday's workout, but Auggie's been called into the office and Danielle is hosting a PTA luncheon, so she takes the opportunity to get to the gym while she has it. If either one of them knew she'd started exercising again. . .Annie can only imagine the resulting arguments. Even with her doctor's approval for low intensity workouts, they think it is too soon for her to be that active.

Their opinions don't overly concern her though. She didn't work this hard for her level of athleticism to lose it all after one surgery, no matter how major the procedure was. At one of her follow-ups, Dr. Snyder had admitted that it was her body's prime condition that had helped her survive being impaled. She means to treat it well.

Of course, she does have to take it easy. Annie only walks on the treadmill at a steady pace until a stitch bites into her side and her breathing becomes a little labored. She sticks to five and eight pound weights because she doesn't want to risk reinjuring herself and pushing back her return date. Auggie may not mind her staying home from the DPD a little while longer, but it would drive her nuts. She already feels trapped inside the apartment as it is.

She grabs her gym bag, water bottle, and keys, already feeling a little stronger.

* * *

><p>Day by day, Annie pushes forward, letting go of her grief and her guilt and her confusion an ounce at a time. She marks the conclusion of each twenty-four hour cycle in a mini-calendar, crossing each square off as it occurs.<p>

She tallies the 'X's. It's now been six weeks since the explosion.

Depending on her mood, Annie feels that the time has flown by or that it has crawled. She calculates how many days she has left until her doctors will call her healed and clear her for field work.

"Only two more weeks," she says quietly.

It's almost midnight and the air is stuffy, but it's too cold outside to open the windows. Annie stares at the ceiling in the dark, her eyes following the curved lines of the scalloped paint illuminated by the glowing numbers of the alarm clock.

Auggie turns on the bed, facing her. He props his head up with one hand, lying on his side. "You can take more time, Annie. You don't have to push yourself to go back."

Even though she knows he means well, those are the exact words she _didn't_ want to hear tonight.

Auggie's been trying to convince her to take more time off for the past few days. He doesn't think she's ready to go back. Annie's not sure she is either, but she can't keep staying at home, grieving and feeling guilty for not grieving enough. She'll never get better that way.

"I have to go back," she says. "I can't keep missing work."

"It's not like Joan is going to fire you." His hand runs up and down her arm, but she thinks it is more to distract her than to provide comfort or reassurance. Auggie probably doesn't want to get into another argument about her returning to work—a common occurrence since she informed him she was going back as soon as she was cleared for duty.

"She might rethink that," Annie replies. "Between this and losing Ben, I've missed almost three full months of work since I started." She tries to make it into a joke, but it's too soon. Even referencing Ben's death cuts her, makes her throat contract to hold in the flood of grief that suddenly rises in her chest.

Annie doesn't know why she brings up her past. Maybe it is because, other than the loss of her baby, Ben's death is the only instance of true sorrow that she has experienced. It is the only thing that she can make comparisons to.

When the Indian doctors told her that Ben had died in emergency surgery, the devastation she felt nearly destroyed her. She didn't return to work for almost a month and a half. Joan had threatened to terminate her employment with the DPD at that point. And she almost left. It was Auggie who convinced her to stay.

Now he's trying to convince her to stay away, to wait.

Annie is tired of waiting. She's tired of sitting in the apartment with nothing to do, with only her thoughts and her memories to keep her company. In the four weeks of recovering at home, Annie hasn't spent much time outside of the apartment beyond grocery shopping and checkups with her doctor. Since she usually spends her days at work or traveling, she's not used to sitting idly. Her good days are when she's able to sneak away to the gym for an hour or so.

She continues to stare at the ceiling, her hands resting on her lower stomach where the bandages have become smaller, lighter, but are still present. Her hands trace the scar beneath the layered Band-Aids. It is where she imagines a C-section incision would be.

She does some more mental math and comes up with the number ten. If not for the explosion, she'd be ten weeks along now. She would have known she was pregnant. Annie would have been scared . . . but also excited. Even if she felt relived at losing the pregnancy at first—a feeling she still can't understand—Annie knows that she would have been happy.

If she were still pregnant, she and Auggie would be dealing with a whole different set of issues. They'd be predicting if the baby would be a boy of a girl, choosing names, maybe even trying to find a bigger place, a home in the suburbs with a backyard and a nursery. They would be sharing the good news with family and friends, confident that she'd make it through the most vulnerable part of her pregnancy.

"I'd almost be through my first trimester." Her voice cracks with the weight of that realization.

Auggie reaches for her and draws her body into his side, wrapping his arm around her back. Annie buries her face into the crook of his neck, seeking the warmth of his body to fight the 'what ifs' running through her head.

What if she had been ten more feet from the blast zone? What if the shrapnel had hit her shoulder instead of her abdomen? What if the doctors could have saved the fetus she hadn't known she was carrying? What if, what if, what if?

Realistically, Annie knows that starting a family with Auggie means quitting the Agency. Part of her isn't ready to do that yet—give up the life she knows to settle down. At the very least she would have to give up being a field agent. As much as she believes that women can work and help raise a family at the same time, she wouldn't feel comfortable putting herself at risk when she knows her child's life is affected by her career choices.

Annie really didn't lie to him when she said that she wasn't ready for kids. She's unconvinced that she would be a good mom—she's still in awe of Danielle's seemingly natural maternal skills—but a large family is something Auggie wants. He's talked to her before about how he would move back to the suburbs to raise a family, given the chance. He'd go to every school event, cheer at every sports game, and spend his nights helping his kids with their fractions. There's no doubt in Annie's mind that he would be a great father, blind or not.

But Annie's only just found her foothold at the Agency. She's one of the best field agents at the DPD. It isn't Jai's name being tossed around the office water cooler anymore: it's Annie Walker, the little spy that could.

Is she really ready to give that up?

Sometimes the answer is yes, other times, no. The debate going on in her head—whether she wants to return to work or consider giving up the job to be a mother and a wife—only confuses her more.

"Day by day," Auggie whispers into her scalp, his warm breath making her shiver and burrow deeper into his embrace. Her right hand moves to the back of his neck, fingers gripping the hair at his nape, silently communicating how much she needs to be held, how much she needs to have something to hold on to.

She inhales deeply. She will take it one day at a time, but what happens when her time is up? What happens when the decision must be made?

There is too much time. There is not enough.

* * *

><p>"Why don't you come shopping with me and the girls on Monday? Katia and Chloe need new Christmas dresses for the family photo," Danielle comments casually over a forkful of spinach.<p>

The invitation seems genuine enough, but one glance in Auggie's direction and Annie knows that this is a ploy to keep her busy, to distract her from returning to the DPD for a while longer. Somehow Auggie has gained an ally in his quest to delay her from going back to work.

Annie nibbles at the chicken in front of her, so Danielle continues with her attempted manipulation. "You haven't seen the girls since the accident. They really miss you."

"I can't," Annie says flatly. Just the thought of seeing her nieces makes her tense up. She misses them too—talking to them on the phone about their schoolwork just doesn't cut it—but she's not ready to see them yet.

"Why not?"

"I go back to work on Monday, remember?"

"Isn't it a bit soon?" She doesn't try to hide her displeasure with Annie's decision.

Auggie puts in his two cents. "I've been trying to tell her that, Dani. It's too soon."

They are ganging up on her. When did these two decide it would be a good idea to double-team her? Being backed into a corner has never been an acceptable position to Annie. She is not going to let them bully her.

Gently—unnecessarily carefully—she sets down her knife and fork. The utensils hardly clink against the porcelain plate. Remaining calm and collected against their tag-team efforts will show them she's ready. She'll prove it to them both.

"I've been on leave for almost six weeks. That's more than enough time off," she begins. "Most people go back to work after four weeks. I'm lucky the Smithsonian is holding my position."

Out of the corner of her eye she sees Auggie turn his chin up toward the ceiling, looking away from her, rolling his eyes in exasperation. But it's her sister's reaction that Annie is interested in. Danielle stares at her, jaw set, for a few extended seconds before pushing her sealed lips to the right side of her face and focusing on her food again.

For a few moments Annie is victorious. She takes a drink from her glass of water, smiling to herself. It wasn't so hard. The moment of silence gives Danielle just enough time to change tactics and re-launch the discussion in a slightly different direction.

"I thought you were going to think about leaving altogether. What happened to that?"

It's true that she and Danielle discussed Annie quitting, but that conversation happened right after the explosion, when Annie told Danielle that she had been hurt. Promising to consider leaving her job was the only way to keep her sister calm.

"I'm one of their top employees. I can't quit."

"There are probably dozens of other people out there that could do your job just as good as you."

Blood rushes to her ears. Her pulse jumps with anger. "No there's not," she grinds out. "You have no _idea_ what I do and how important my job is. And I'm _good_ at it, Danielle. I'm really fucking good at it. They can't just replace me!"

Even as she says it, she knows it's not true. Though she pushes the thought from her mind, she knows that the DPD, Joan and Arthur, could replace her with little effort.

"Annie. . ." Auggie's voice is a warning. She's getting too close. If she's not careful, something could slip out and then she'd really be screwed. They would both be in serious shit with Joan.

The sudden outburst momentarily stuns Danielle. Growing up, Annie hardly ever fought with her sister. Eighteen years later, Annie is finally learning how to stand up for herself and not let her sister baby her.

The younger sibling takes a deep breath. "My mind is already made up. I'm going back. I've been cleared."

Finally her sister bounces back into the argument, but now she is grasping for control. All her fingers find are skinny straws, opinions. "You're not ready!"

Annie is on her feet then, fists on the table, body leaning in the direction of her older sister, who pulls back. Auggie stands as well, poised to rein Annie in, as though he's afraid she'll dive across the table and strangle Danielle. Her fingers clench tighter, fighting the urge.

"I know what and what I'm not ready for. It's _my_ body. It's _my _decision. If you don't like it, Dani, leave!"

Auggie interjects. "Danielle, that won't be necessary."

"If she's not supporting me, I don't want her here," Annie insists, her eyes never wavering from her sister's shocked gaze.

And there it is. That is what she wants, what she needs. Support. She craves it. Until this point, she thought Auggie's support was enough—and it is—but Annie needs to know her sister is behind her, with her.

All their lives they've had each other's backs. In schoolyard fights they faced down the bullies at recess together. As a united front they showed all the stable kids—the ones that didn't move every eight or twelve months because their fathers were in the military—that they didn't need anyone else's approval. They had each other.

After their mother's sudden passing, they relied on one another even more. But then it began to change. Suddenly the two years that separated them in age seemed like decades. Danielle started taking care of Annie, until Annie couldn't stand it and had to get out on her own for a while. Somehow she'd ended up exploring the world, getting her heart broken, and joining the CIA.

Now she is here, staring at her older sister, waiting to see if this is going to be the breaking point. Unwanted tears come to her eyes as the loaded seconds tick by. She's so sure that Danielle is going to get up and leave.

"Annie—" Danielle starts, and the tears in Annie's eyes have transferred to her sister's voice.

Auggie's phone rings unexpectedly. It's the DPD ringtone. He shifts beside her, as though unsure if he should answer. But when the ringing continues, his sense of duty takes over.

"Excuse me a moment. I have to take this," he says, before quickly making his way into the bedroom for some privacy.

Something about the interruption takes the edge out of the argument. The atmosphere is a little less tense. Her hands slowly uncurl and she flexes the lingering stiffness from her fingers. Still, she's waiting for an answer.

"I still don't think it's a good idea for you to go back to work," Danielle says.

Annie's eyes close tightly, squeezing back the wetness in her ducts.

"But. . ." her sister continues, "I'm here for you, Annie. I'm always here for you. You know that, right?"

Annie sinks back into her seat and looks up through her lashes, the water finally spilling onto her cheeks. But they are not tears of disappointment or anger or resentment. They are relief.

"I don't think I can do this without you," she says.

This time it is Danielle that stands. She walks around the table and leans over Annie, wrapping her up in her arms. The last time her sister gave her this kind of comfort, Annie had been crying over Ben. She'd needed Danielle then too.

"I'm your sister. Anything you need, Anne, I'm here." She kisses the top of her head and, in this moment, Annie is okay with being mothered. It's been so long since she's had a real mother to hush away the tears and the nightmares, the fears and doubts.

* * *

><p>When Auggie emerges from the bedroom, the sisters have just finished loading the dishwasher. He pauses momentarily, as if he's testing the air for a hostility reading.<p>

Annie smiles. "All's good on the home front."

"Glad that was fast," he says.

"What could the Smithsonian want at this hour on a Friday?" Danielle asks.

Auggie rubs the back of his neck, trying to look exasperated at having to talk with his boss. He pulls it off well, Annie thinks.

"It seems an important, priceless artifact that was thought to be lost since the American Revolution has resurfaced. Our boss wanted me to track down the seller right away so the museum will have a better chance of acquiring the artifact."

Annie reads his body movements to help her decode his message. The phone call had something to do with the barge explosion that nearly took her life. She can tell by how he sways from foot to foot, uneasy. She wants to know what is going on for sure though.

"Oh, sounds exciting," Danielle says semi-enthusiastically, then pulls a homemade pie from the oven. "I've made apple pie for dessert."

Annie groans inwardly. Dessert will just further delay the discussion she wants to have with Auggie.

"Sounds fantastic," Auggie says, patting his stomach and smiling. "Bring it on."

* * *

><p>It takes almost another hour before they have the apartment to themselves.<p>

"The flash-drive is back in the game?" Annie asks as soon as she's sure her sister is gone.

He doesn't hesitate. "Yes. And that's not the only thing that's resurfaced."

They make their way into the bedroom as Auggie begins with: "Kate Harris had an accomplice, remember?"

"Joan said his name was Jack Benson."

"Right. He survived the explosion, Annie."

"She didn't tell me that." She's starting to think that she's been left out of a lot of important conversations lately, that she doesn't have all the necessary details. While it's nice having Auggie to keep her up to date, she'd rather get her information first hand. It's just another reason for her to return to work.

"You had other things to worry about," he responds. "You're officially off the case by the way. Joan doesn't want you anywhere near this."

That revelation does not go down easily. Annie swallows hard. "What? Why not? I should be helping."

"Annie, you said yourself you didn't even know about Jack Benson. And you're only approved for desk duty. Not field."

"I could consult."

"Do you want to know what's going on or not? I'm trying to fill you in here."

"Go on."

"Jack Benson apparently made off with the flash-drive. We were hoping it had been destroyed in the explosion, but it appears we weren't that lucky." He wipes a hand across his face. "We didn't just let Benson get away though. We have a tap on his phone and hacked into his computer. His location is unknown, but we do know what he's up to."

"What's he doing with the flash-drive?" She thinks she already knows. It's what she and Jai failed to stop.

"He put word out to the Russians today that he has the intelligence they've been seeking, for a price of course. And it seems Benson is greedier than his cohort, Ms. Harris. He's demanding five million."

Annie exhales at the ridiculous number. All things considered, it's probably a small sum where black market intelligence is concerned, but she's still not used to big bucks being thrown around casually.

"The Russians didn't want to pay him the two million last time," she says, "There's no way that they'll pay that."

"I wouldn't be so sure," he responds, "We've been receiving communications indicating the Russians are paranoid about a mole within their top division. Benson is promising to reveal that mole."

"Are you saying we have a mole in Russian Intelligence?" she asks as she removes her blouse and bra and pulls on a tank top.

He sighs and the sound is heavy. "I honestly don't know. That information is classified. I couldn't get it out of Joan."

"That has to be a yes."

"I'm inclined to agree. But, even if the person the Russians are after isn't one of us, we _do_ have undercover operations going on in Russia that would be exposed."

Annie remembers the initial meeting with Joan before the trip to Yorktown and the incident on the barge. She'd said there were dozens of confidential names on that drive. Dozens of people's lives are still in jeopardy. Annie knows it's not her fault—Auggie's said it so often that she is sure it wasn't her fault—but part of her feels responsible.

Auggie pulls his sweater over his head and climbs in between the covers, ready for bed. "I'm going in first thing tomorrow to be tech support for an op they're running. They're going to try to retrieve the drive before it's handed off to the Russians. Again. Joan has people working on locating Benson now. It's critical that we find him before he gives over the intel."

"Why didn't Joan call you in?" Annie asks as she lies down next to him.

Auggie's eyes dart back and forth and he pauses, trying to avoid the question. Eventually he gives in and answers her. "She gave me the option."

"You didn't take it?" she questions.

"There are others who are just as capable at finding Benson, so I chose to stay here, with you."

"Auggie, you can't do that!" Annie scolds, a flash of anger running through her. "I'm not as important as getting that information."

Auggie sits straight up in bed and turns to her. "You're more important than any intel, Annie."

"But—"

He stops her by cupping her face in his warm hands. For being blind, he's doing a pretty good job of making eye contact with her. His brown irises are black in the dark bedroom. She's not sure if it's from the lack of lighting or if it is because of his fierce insistence when he says, "You will always come first."

Annie nods, unable to argue with him staring at her like that, with such intensity.

His fingers slide down her jaw line, then grip her chin gently before he leans in and closes his lips over hers in a possessive yet gentle kiss.

His last words echo in her mind. It's been almost six weeks since they've touched each other. And, right now, her body reminds her how good it feels to have Auggie's hands on her.

Tentatively, her mouth opens to his kisses. Auggie doesn't rush in. Instead, he takes his time to suck on her bottom lip and press kisses into the corners of her mouth before slipping his tongue against hers. His fingers curve lightly at the base of her neck, pressing just firmly enough to get her to tilt her head back. With his other hand he pushes her hair away from her face and twirls the ends between his fingers.

The tenderness of his attention makes Annie ache low her in belly.

"Auggie. . ." she sighs when he begins to pull away.

Their breathing is a little ragged. She knows that he's holding back, like he's done ever since she came home, but that's not what she wants.

"I need. . ." Her voice trembles with the desire she feels tugging at her core.

But he misinterprets her tone and shifts, turning away. She reaches for him, lays a hand on the middle of his chest, and then slides it up his collarbone, his neck, and finally brings his face back to hers.

"I need this." She leans into his body and lowers her mouth onto his lips.

When her mouth becomes insistent, Auggie moves his attention to her neck, regulating their speed. "Take it slow, Annie."

Placing his palm on her shoulder, he pushes her back onto the mattress while continuing to kiss her collarbone, to kiss the hollow where her pulse beats rapidly because she can't make her heartbeat slow down while he's touching her.

His fingers begin to lift the hem of her tank top and Annie freezes. Her body goes rigid. He notices the change right away and lifts his head. "Do you want me to stop?"

Annie takes a deep, calming breath. Another.

"No," she breathes. It's the truth. She needs this. She needs him. But the bandages—the ones Auggie's mouth had made her forget until this moment—suddenly pull on her skin. She doesn't know how to explain to him why her stomach is still off limits.

"I won't touch it," he whispers, understanding the source of her hesitance.

His ability to read her is one of the reasons she loves him so much, so deeply. The ache returns, stronger than before.

"Please. . ." She's not sure if it's a plea for him to continue what they've started, or if she's still pleading with him to not touch the Band-Aids.

Auggie's hands pull her top up from her sides. Then he hooks his thumbs under the fabric of her underwear and pulls them down, slipping them off her ankles. He kisses his way back up her legs, his tongue teasing her inner thigh.

When his lips close over her, Annie releases the remaining tension in her chest on a breathy moan. Her back arches as she tries not to buck her hips into his warm mouth. His tongue circles her clitoris slowly, languidly, until he has to hold her thighs open and against the mattress so she can't squirm.

"Auggie. . ." This time it _is_ a plea.

It is ignored. Auggie doesn't quicken the pace, even though she desperately wants him to.

The steady rhythm he keeps causes the pressure inside her to build up gradually, powerfully. Tears prick at the corners of her eyes, the sensation is so intense.

Then his tongue runs over her again and she cries out, the tears spilling onto her cheeks. She spasms in waves that roll through her entire body, pooling in between her legs. Her release is both sweet and sad.

When her orgasm finally fades, she feels weak.

At some point, while the sensations overtook her, Auggie moved to lie beside her again. His body spoons hers, his chin resting in the dip between her neck and shoulder. Annie can feel his hard length pressing into the curve of her lower back, but he doesn't move against her restlessly. She doesn't understand why he's stopped when only half of the job is done.

Her hand begins to reach for him, but Auggie's catches it and brings it back up to her chest.

"Not tonight," he says.

"But. . ."

"It's not about what I need. Not tonight," he repeats. He presses a soft kiss behind her ear.

New tears form in her eyes. She doesn't know how to respond. It scares her to know how much he cares for her.

Auggie is already asleep—breathing deeply, steadily—when she is finally able to speak again. "I love you."

* * *

><p><strong>Please review. The bunnies are begging for carrots. Even skinny ones.<strong>

**No reviews, to me, translates as "I didn't have anything good to say about what I read." I hate to put it like that, but it's true. :\**

**In Part Six, we'll see Joan's POV. Not sure of a chapter title yet though. I'll hope you'll check it out. :)  
><strong>


	6. Best Laid Plans

**A tremendous thank you to everyone who reviewed. Hope you enjoy this chapter too. I've taken some liberties with Joan's past since we don't know much about her or how she got to her position.**

**Fans of "Alias" will recognize a familiar name in this chapter. Not sure if I am borrowing the character or just the name yet.  
><strong>

**Note: From Joan's point of view.**

* * *

><p><em>Part Six: Best Laid Plans<em>

Being the director of the Domestic Protection Division has its drawbacks. Most she's gotten used to after five years on the job. The long hours, the high stress levels, and the knowledge that every morning brings new problems that must be dealt with are all routine. These issues don't bother her as much as they did when she was first appointed to the position. Though she's responsible and accountable for the actions of her twelve field agents, twenty-three analysts, and dozens more personnel, she has accepted the role with little hesitation.

What bothers Joan Campbell most is having to restrain her natural reaction, generally intense frustration, when something goes wrong.

As a senior officer of the DPD, she can't storm off or commiserate with her staff at the local bar when she has a bad day. She also can't rant about work to her husband because he's also her boss—a circumstance that is sometimes convenient, but in many cases undesirable.

At all times Joan must remain level-headed and strong in the face of adversity.

Even when—especially when—a critical mission fails like it is now.

"We're in pursuit," Kurt's voice says through the com-link.

"Do not lose sight of that vehicle!" Arthur nearly shouts into his headset. He shifts beside her, clearly agitated.

His presence makes everyone in Auggie's office, including her, nervous to some degree. Arthur's involvement proves just how important it is that this operation goes smoothly, which it hasn't. At all. What makes it worse is that this is the second time they've sent out a team to retrieve Senator Kridler's stolen flash-drive. The first hadn't gone as planned, and the current mission appears to be sticking to that unacceptable trend.

Maybe she should have sent Jai back into the field, even if his rib fractures are only freshly healed. Joan watches him scowl at the screen in front of them, but guesses he's not as angered by the rapidly deteriorating mission as he is by not finishing what he started in Yorktown six weeks ago.

He'd asked to be put on the team headed to Boston to intercept Jack Benson—it is the only time Joan can remember Jai almost pleading to be part of an assignment—but she had denied his request. Joan isn't going to let one of her best agents risk reinjury just to prove himself or soothe his wounded pride. Right now—with Wilcox and Walker out of the game—she's running low on star agents.

Kurt and Angela are a good team, her next best duo and a pair that Joan can usually trust to get a job done efficiently. They found Jack Benson in Boston with little hassle, yet every other aspect of this operation has gone amuck.

"The car is headed into the heart of the city," Angela relays.

Joan, Arthur, and Jai track their agents' vehicle on the map displayed on Auggie's screen.

"We should've grabbed Benson when we had the chance," Auggie comments under his breath.

Joan agrees with the head of her Tech Ops Department. If Kurt and Angela had apprehended Jack Benson in the parking garage before his contacts arrived—like Joan wanted them to—they would be in possession of the all-important flash-drive. It wouldn't have come down to a car chase in the middle of Boston.

It was Arthur who had changed the plan. Once again—she's lost count of how many times it's happened—an operation was ripped out from under her by her interfering superior. She'd been overruled with a powerplay right in front of Jai and Auggie, a move that will most certainly buy her husband a night in the guest room.

"Catching the Russian agents is just as important as getting that intel back," Arthur responds coldly. "We need to know what agency they're working for."

It's not the first—and it surely won't be the last—time she has disagreed with her husband. Their priorities were not in order on this operation. And it has cost them.

Part of Joan understands; Arthur has superiors of his own that he answers to. The leaders of the Company want their deep-cover operatives to stay in place, to complete their missions. If they don't, Arthur will be at fault. Given the debacle with Liza Hearn's exploitative article last year, a bad performance is the last thing he needs. Still, if he hadn't claimed authority over the mission, they would have the flash-drive right now. She loves and respects him, but sometimes Arthur just makes poor decisions.

A series of horns blow distantly in their ears and Kurt lets out an unrestrained expletive before laying hard on his own horn.

"We've lost visual of the car, Director," Angela reports, her voice empty with shame.

Arthur is the first to react. He removes his headset in a flurry of violent movements and slams it onto Auggie's desk. Pivoting sharply in his leather loafers, he exits the office.

Joan purses her lips—the only physical sign of her displeasure—by this turn of events. Her husband's lack of restraint makes her job harder. It's as though she must remain more stoic and collected to compensate for his unprofessional behavior.

"Fuck." Beside her, Jai vocalizes her true sentiments, the ones that she can't voice outside the privacy of her own office.

"Director Campbell? Orders?" Angela asks.

"Return to headquarters," she replies shortly.

"Yes, ma'am."

The three remaining DPD officers remove their headsets. Auggie exits out of the tracking window on the computer and rubs a hand over his face.

"Do we have an alternative plan?" Jai questions.

If it were any other agents in the room, she wouldn't dignify that question with a response. But she's known Jai and Auggie since she relocated to the upstairs office. They are two of only a handful of people she can be honest with. Of course, she still keeps certain secrets and thoughts private but, in this case, she sees no need to hide the truth.

"No," she says. She keeps her voice even, not allowing the uncertainty she feels to come through her tone. She is still the one in charge; appearances must be kept.

"What about our people?" Auggie asks next. "The names on that drive. . ..We're not going to extract the agents?"

"To my knowledge, there are no plans to do so."

"So, we're just gonna give up our people to the Russians?" His voice doesn't conceal his distaste for the situation or the lack of action being taken. "We're just gonna burn them?"

Auggie should really check himself, but Joan isn't about to chastise him when his emotions reflect her own.

"I'm not going to give up my operatives that easily," Joan says resolutely. "Monitor any and all Russian communications until I say otherwise. Alert me if anything comes up."

"You got it," Auggie says, his tone still a little heated. He turns to his computer again.

"Jai," Joan says, "touch base with your eastern contacts. Ask them to keep you updated with any activity. I want to know the second Jack Benson lands in Russia."

"What makes you think they'll take him there? Why not just kill him?" Jai asks.

It's a valid argument. "We'll have to hope that Benson had an insurance policy on the flash-drive."

Jai nods, follows her out of Auggie's office, and veers toward his desk.

Even though Benson and Kate Harris didn't seem to be very versed in the ways of espionage, Joan is hoping that the incident on the barge in Yorktown made Benson realize that his life is at risk. She's cautiously optimistic that he's encrypted the flash-drive files or created some other barrier for the Russians to break through before they can get the intel. There's some reason the foreign agents abducted him in the parking garage instead of killing him outright.

Of course, even with these measures in place, it will only buy them a short window to contact their deep-cover agents and extract them. Their window will only stay open until the Russians are done torturing the information or password out of Benson.

Knowing her timeframe shrinks with each passing minute, Joan sets out on her own mission: convincing her husband to extract their most valuable operative before his true identity is revealed.

If they can't get him out before that happens, Benjamin Mercer will be a dead man twice over.

* * *

><p>Arthur is holed up in the shadowy corners of his office—his favorite hiding place. The lights are off and the venetian blinds are shut to all illumination coming from the hallway, a clear indication to secretaries and other staff members that he does not wish to be bothered.<p>

Joan opens the door without knocking—she only announces herself if the situation is personal, if the discussion is going to be about them and not work related. It should probably be the other way around, but this is how their code has developed over the years.

Right now, everything is about business. She needs to know what the next step is going to be.

Arthur looks up at the intrusion but he doesn't appear surprised to see her advancing toward his desk. He holds up his left hand as he places his desk phone back on its cradle with the right.

"Before you start," he says, "I've already ordered immediate extractions for our operatives."

So, it has come down to that. His comment stops her short, but only for a moment. While she's glad that he isn't taking any chances with the lives of their agents, he's withholding something from her, something important.

"All of them?" she asks for clarification.

His eyes narrow slightly and his lips thin out across his jaw—his tell. "Everyone we could pull without alerting the target cells."

"How many, Arthur?" There are twenty-four names on that flash-drive, five of which are under the jurisdiction of the DPD. She wants every agent to be extracted, but she wants her people out most of all.

"Altogether, only twelve. Four were yours."

She doesn't have to ask which one of her operatives is still in the field, unknowingly on the verge of being exposed as a CIA officer. "What about Ben?"

Arthur sighs. "He's in too deep, Joan. You know we can't reach him."

"We have to try. If we can't perform an extraction, we need to warn him at the very least."

"How do you propose we do that? There's been no contact with Mercer for two months," Arthur points out. "He contacts us, not the other way around."

She never said that it would be easy. In fact, just trying to get a message to Ben puts him in more danger. If the FSB, the Russian Federal Security Service, discovers any form of unusual communication, he's likely to be targeted and killed.

"Anderson," Joan states. "He could figure something out."

Arthur gets up from his desk and walks over to where she's standing, crossing his arms. "Even if we can get a message to Mercer, the chance that he'll get out before the intel leaks is minimal."

She is aware of this time pressure. It goes without saying. The reality is that Ben could already be dead; Joan's just unwilling to accept it until proven otherwise.

She's known Ben since she was a senior operations analyst some eight years ago. He's one of the best agents she's ever come across, even if he isn't the most loyal. Going rogue had made her question his dedication to his country, but she quickly realized that he was more dedicated than some of the show runners in D.C. He'd just gotten tired of the bureaucratic bullshit. After she came to that conclusion, Joan couldn't blame him. Ben had even gained more of her respect. She will not give him up without a fight.

"I'll take whatever chance we have at this point, however small."

"Do what you have to do, then. But have a plan in place to deal with the fallout if he's discovered," Arthur warns.

* * *

><p>Auggie sits on the couch in her office, waiting for Joan to tell him why she called him upstairs. She knows what she has to do, but she is also loathe to do it because it will inevitably create tension between her officers on a personal level. Joan knows that it's hard to separate personal feelings from work, especially when coworkers become lovers.<p>

"Measures have been taken to remove some of our deep-cover operatives from their missions," she starts.

"I sense a 'but' coming," he says.

"But, one of our agents is unreachable. Extraction is out of the question. The best we can do is give him notice and hope that he can get out by his own methods in time."

"So, you want me to send out some sort of encrypted message?" Auggie surmises.

"Yes."

"Okay. I'll get Stu and Doug to help me draw something up and—"

Joan interrupts him. "No, Auggie. Only you."

"Why?"

"You're the only officer with a high enough clearance for this task."

Auggie's brow creases in confusion, then thought. "Who's this message going to?"

She sighs and adopts a serious expression, hoping that even if he can't see it, the severe tone of her voice will be clear. This is the part that she was dreading to bring up. "Understand that all conversation surrounding this issue doesn't leave this room from this point forward. You are under strict orders from relaying this information to anyone. Even Annie. Is that clear?"

"Yeah," he says hesitantly.

Joan takes a deep breath and says, "Our undercover operative is Ben Mercer."

Auggie's reaction is something like she expected—raised eyebrows, wide eyes, and a slack jaw.

"He's alive? How?"

"That's not your concern," she says dismissively, standing to signal the end of the conversation. "Now, I don't believe I need to stress how critical it is that this message be sent quickly?"

Auggie stands as well and turns to go. "Got it."

"Auggie, remember," she says. "If Annie should find out about Ben being alive, you will feel the full weight of this department coming down on you."

A brief flash of something crosses his eyes. She thinks it might be anger, but he squelches it quickly.

"Revealing this to her—telling her that the man she thought died over a year ago is alive?—would kill her. I'm not going to put Annie through more pain."

"I'm glad we agree. You may go," she says. "Keep me updated."

* * *

><p>Long after most of her staff has gone home for the day, Joan hears a light knock on her office door and looks up from her computer screen, expecting Auggie or Jai with an update on either Ben Mercer or Jack Benson.<p>

"Annie," she says, truly surprised when the young agent cracks open the door. She stands and motions to the chair in front of her desk. "Come in."

"I just came in to drop off some meatloaf for Auggie," she explains, then smiles slightly. "I've watched way too many food shows lately."

Joan is having trouble reading her junior agent—Annie's hands grip and release the cuffs of her suit jacket nervously, the action conflicting with her lighthearted comment about learning to cook meatloaf. There's some other reason for Annie's visit; she certainly hasn't dropped by to exchange recipes.

Joan leans against the front of her desk and crosses her arms. "What's this about, Annie? You can't come back until Monday."

"I know," she says, taking the seat that Joan indicates. "I was hoping I could persuade you—"

"Absolutely not."

"Yeah, he said you'd say that."

Joan hears the frustrated undercurrent in her voice. She's not sure if Annie is upset with being denied or with her boyfriend's prediction being accurate. Gently she asks, "How are you, Annie?"

Brown eyes look up at her, appearing startled by the change in topic, but they quickly drop to the hands resting in Annie's lap. "I'm. . ."

"The truth, please," Joan says.

"I'm ready to serve my country," she states in a strong voice. "I'm recovered enough for field. I know it."

Joan takes note of the way Annie avoids the question about her health. "That will be for the examiner to determine when you have your psych evaluation."

Annie's head snaps up. "That's not for another two weeks!"

"I know. I'm the one who ordered it." Joan smiles softly. Annie's eagerness reminds her of herself when she was younger and just starting out at the Agency. Firsthand experience has taught her it's easy to put duty ahead of everything else, but the path of least resistance is not always the best path to take. Commitment requires sacrifice.

"Why don't you take a vacation?" Joan suggests. "Spend time with your family. How is your sister?"

Annie continues to look baffled by the shifts in conversation. "Uh, fine. Dani's fine." Annie pauses and picks at her nails. Her head is tilted down when she speaks again. "Actually, she came over for dinner last night."

Joan circles back to her chair and sits down, saying, "You don't sound overly enthused."

"It's just something she said," Annie mumbles. Her tone has changed. It's more subdued, as though she's afraid to share some deep secret.

"What is it, Annie? What did she say that made you come to my office?"

Annie closes her eyes and bites her lower lip. Her body language is not what Joan wants to read. "She. . .she asked why I'm coming back at all."

"And?" Joan prompts when Annie doesn't elaborate.

"And I've been thinking about my reasons." Annie sighs, running her hands over her hair. "I'm just trying to sort everything out."

Her honesty pleases Joan, but she's not as happy with what she's hearing: doubt. It's clear that Annie is conflicted, torn between the desire to return to work and something else.

"Why are you coming back?" Joan asks plainly, but not harshly. She's genuinely curious to hear Annie's answer.

"I told you. I want to serve my country."

Joan raises a questioning eyebrow as she regards her agent. Of course it's an acceptable reason, but sometimes acceptable is not enough. There are some things in life that require more justification. Working for the CIA is one of them.

"There are other ways of serving your country," Joan tells her even though it goes against her goal—to keep Annie employed at the DPD. "Ones with less risk."

"It's not about the risk. . ." she says, though the statement is not entirely convincing.

Part of Joan understands the source of Annie's doubt. After such a traumatic event, it's completely reasonable to question one's abilities, to reevaluate and change. There is a time in every CIA officer's career—whether they are a field agent, a technician, or an analyst—that challenges their dedication to the job.

Faced with the possible departure of her agent with the biggest potential, Joan is not going to let a decision be made based on hasty, emotion-driven evaluations. Trying to phrase her words diplomatically while also being sympathetic, Joan says, "I believe a decision to resign from your position at the DPD would be premature and ill-advised."

"I'm not going to quit—"

Joan holds up her hand to stop Annie's protest. Even if she's sure of Annie's loyalty and has every confidence that she will return, the decision is ultimately in Annie's hands. But she doesn't want Annie making that decision at present.

She stares directly into Annie's eyes until the younger woman nods to show that her words have been heard and absorbed. Then she adds, "I'll give you as much time as you need, Annie, to make an informed, calculated decision."

The younger woman nods and stands to leave, knowing that Joan will not listen to any other arguments.

When she's almost at the office door, Joan says, "I'd really hate to lose you. This department truly benefits from your service and knowledge."

Annie nods slowly. "Thank you."

Joan wishes there was something else she could do to help Annie make what might be the hardest decision of her life. There was a time when Joan had to make such a decision too-between staying with the DPD and being a mother. Something tells her that Annie is going through a similar debate with herself.

Joan grabs a note card from her top desk drawer as Annie moves to leave again. She quickly jots down a name and phone number that she memorized long ago.

"Annie?" Joan calls to stop her. She gets up, moves to where the younger blonde is standing by the doorway, and hands her the card.

"Dr. Judy Barnett?" Annie reads, then frowns. "I don't want a therapist."

She tries to give the card back, but Joan pushes her hand away. "Keep it in case you change your mind. She specializes in grief counseling surrounding miscarriage, infertility, and the loss of a child."

Annie looks from the card to Joan, a quizzical expression creeping onto her face at the explanation.

"You've been to see her?" Annie asks, her voice soft and cautious.

The dull ache of painful memories thuds inside of Joan's chest; it's the same ache she always gets when she thinks of the past. It's not as sharp as it used to be, but it still hurts.

Joan nods, licking her suddenly dry lips. "I know what you're going through, Annie. Maybe not exactly, but I know."

Annie swallows audibly. "You and Arthur had. . ."

"A son," Joan answers the unfinished question. "Samuel. He died three weeks before his second birthday."

Annie's shocked expression starts to give way to tears, signaling Joan to wrap things up. She doesn't like when other people get emotional over her story. It's one of the reasons she keeps it quiet. She doesn't want her agents to pity her. But, Annie will benefit from the revelation, she hopes. Joan wants her to see that there is life after tragedy and that that life can involve working for the DPD.

"If I can help you," Joan offers, "all you have to do is ask."

Annie stuffs the therapist's card in her jacket pocket, nods, then leaves.

Joan retreats back to her desk and sits with a heavy sigh. "Stay strong, Walker."

* * *

><p><strong>How 'bout that twist? Were you expecting Ben to pop up? Do you think Auggie will keep his promise to not tell Annie anything?<strong>

**Things are about to get inneresting. ;)**

**Also, I probably won't be able to update next week because I have finals (thank god this semester is almost over!), so this one's going to be a bit of a cliffhanger. But that's okay, because it will give you time to formulate theories and leave me some comments.**

**By the way, I-and my sometimes temperamental muse-would appreciate it if you hit that review button. Thanks!  
><strong>


End file.
